I'm a vegetarian, except for fish, and the occasional steak. I LOVE STEAK!!: The analysis of sexuality of Penny

 

More often then some would like to say, women are marginalized in the media.  Whether it is in the news or as just a love interest in TV shows or movies. For instance, like in When Harry Met Sally. Yet, there is a shift in society and some TV shows and movies, to show women as more than a love interest. Women are becoming CEO's and there are more women getting college degrees. More women are becoming empowered to what they want.  

   On The Big Bang Theory, as a regular character, Penny is known as the air head girl.  She is the typical superficial girl.  She is free loading, uses her looks to get places, and she loves to speak her mind.  Penny is very outgoing and not educated, which looks bad compared to the other characters in the show.  Yet, she gets by on her common sense.  Penny contributes to what is normal about girls on TV, but also challenges it. 

    Penny is a character that is susceptible to marginalization.  The Big Bang Theory passes two out of three questions in the Bechdel test.  According to Feminist Frequency. com the Bechdel test works like this,

"Here’s how it works, a movie just has to pass these three simple questions: the first, are there two or more women in it who have names, the second, do they talk to each other, and the third, do they talk to each other about something other then a man (feministfrequency.com)."

The Big Bang Theory answers two of these questions.  It has two or more girls on the show.  They are Penny, Bernadette, and Amy.  Also it answers, the second question, these girls do talk to each other.  Unfortunately, I can't really say that the trio has talked about much more than men, relationships and sex.  They might sometimes, but not the balk of their conversations.  This means that The Big Bang Theory fails this test.

     Penny challenges the norms for patriarchal by being strong willed.  The patriarchal norms for women would be submissive and are often portrayed in submissive poses.  For instance, lying down and bending their knees.  When heterosexual couples are shown the man is often taller an implied power difference.  Also, media often portrays women with the common trait of “licensed withdrawal”.  This is where women appear to be distracted-avoiding eye contact, withdrawing their attention, and day dreaming (Hodkinson 222).

     Penny challenges this in her relationship with Leonard.  Penny often proves Leonard wrong with her common sense and doesn’t really take a lot of his crap.  When Penny and Leonard are together they are on the same playing field.  Penny never is really in a submissive position.  She is seen as an equal, which would challenge this ideal.   Penny is often portrayed with the rest of the cast as in the center.  She is often surrounded by the other male cast members and is in a sense of power in the middle of everyone. Penny and Leonard are about the same size.  So there is no implied power difference.  In the Penny and Leonard relationship Leonard would be the one with the common trait of “licensed withdrawal”.  This is because Penny is very outgoing and will speak her mind.  When Leonard is a little shy and will be the first to avoid eye contact with someone or with drawl attention because he is scared or embarrassed.  Penny is often treated as an object, yet her outgoing personality helps her.

    The male gaze is how men portray women in the media as objects.  In The Big Bang Theory, Penny is portrayed as an object by the way her boyfriend’s treat her.  To the boys that Penny hooks up with, she is just an object.  In one of the episodes Penny says that her now ex-boyfriend posted their sex life on a blog site.  The man that she was dating treated Penny as an object.  Now, Penny is not a girl that would take this.   Her character stands up for herself by throwing the man’s IPod out the window and calling him a "Self-centered BASTARD".  Penny sands up for herself yet in this episode she was portrayed as an object. 

        Penny is a great example of a character that is portrayed as being very famine and a typical girl.  Yet, Penny’s strong willed personality and almost bully persona stops her from being objectified and when she does get objectified she stands up for herself.  Whitch usually means she uses her outgoing personality to speak her mind.