Pretty woman vs pretty person

Judith Butler in her essay Performative Acts and Gender Constitution discusses phenomenology theory and feminist theory. The phenomenological theory “seeks to explain the mundane way in which social agents constitute social reality through language, gesture, and all manner of social sign.” Basically, what she says is that if gender is constructed through acts, then it is just a constructed identity. Something really interesting brought up in this essay is what it means to be a woman. Being a woman is a historical idea rather than natural fact. There is a distinction between sex, a biological facticity, and gender, the cultural interpretation of this facticity. To be called a woman is something that has to be earned by the way you act in society.

A film I think Butler’s writing applies to is Pretty Woman. This film is about Vivian, a hooker, who meets Edward, a rich businessman looking for someone to spend time with. While the idea of two people from very different worlds falling in love is not a new concept, the idea of gender and roles is looked at a lot. Vivian is constantly looked down on because of her career choice. Sex is something that is still considered taboo when it comes to women. Women are not supposed to be sexually promiscuous nor should they use their bodies to make money. Well, that is what we have engrained in our society. There is this idea that to be a woman, you need to be classy, well dressed, behave in a proper manner and so much more. The worst part really is that other women hold each other up to these standards. In the film, Vivian goes to buy new clothes, but is not taken seriously by the ladies working in the store because of how she is dressed. Although things are moving in a better direction than when the film was made, there still is this idea of how women should act and the first step is for women to stop judging each other and holding each other to near impossible standards.

The roles of Edward and Vivian, and their dynamic is interesting to look at. Edward is this wealthy businessman, someone who is respected. Yet he is quite ruthless and happy to put people out of work to make a profit. Vivian does not have this same respect, but seems to be nice and loyal when it comes to her friends, a contrast to Edward in terms of morality. Only when Vivian starts to change the way she dresses and speaks does Edward feel comfortable bringing her to events. Because only then is she a pretty woman. And when Edwards partner finds out Vivian is a hooker, he almost applauds Edwards, and then completely disrespects Vivian and expects that she’ll have sex with him. The gender inequality is very obvious in the film and is still very relevant today. Men get away with things women can’t. But it is ok in our society, because men are also expected to behave in certain ways. As they say, boys will be boys.

I think that gender is a social construct that people often try to use interchangeably with sex, and it is not the same thing. I focused more on how women are expected to act in certain ways but the same is true for men. Society has created this idea of what women and men should be and how they should behave. It isn’t so black and white. People are unique and shouldn’t be expected to fit the exact same behavioural standards.