The Dirt that Exists within the Society of Mean Girls
This image is a still from the movie Mean Girls. By the pumpkin lights, costumes, and drinks, we can assume that the characters within this frame are at a Halloween Party. The three girls, Cady Heron, Gretchen Weiners, and Karen Smith, are all gathered together in a group. Cady Heron, the furthest character to the left, is dressed in a zombie bride costume. As one can tell, Cady is quite passionate about Halloween and dressing in a costume. Here she is wearing a wedding dress, veil, angel wings, and a wig, as well as fake blood and teeth. Gretchen (middle) and Karen (right) are seen to be dressed in these form-fitting, sexy animal costumes. In this image, Gretchen and Karen are looking at Cady and her outfit with horror and disgust. In response, Cady is looking at her friends in a confused manner. By the look on her face, one can assume that she is thinking, “Why are my friends looking at me weirdly? Is it something that I am wearing?”
Looking at this still, I was reminded of concepts that were mentioned in the excerpts from Purity and Danger by Mary Douglas. Douglas adapted concepts proposed by Durkheim and adapted them into social anthropology. In this piece, she describes how those in society organize themselves into social groups based on rituals of purity and impurity. She shows how these rituals govern the experience of those within a group. To convey her point, she introduces the concept of dirt. She describes it as a thing that contains power, is dangerous, and transformative. There is no concrete definition of dirt, “it only exists in the eyes of the beholder” (Douglas 2002:2). The reason why we attempt to get rid of dirt is not because of fear or terror, but because it is something that disrupts order within society. The action of getting rid of dirt should not be looked down upon, it should be regarded as a positive effort to create unity within a society. We use dirt as a metaphor for beliefs or actions that deviate or pollute a given group or society. We use these polluted beliefs in a discourse of "claims and counter-claims to status" (Douglas 2002: 4).
After analyzing this image, one can see the great connection between the theories proposed by Douglas and the group dynamics pictured here. The women in Mean Girls are the beholders of their own definitions of dirt that they use to regulate the environment they create amongst themselves. More specifically, Gretchen and Karen, and the other girl seen behind them in this image, have formulated their own definition of what women should wear on Halloween, an example of this being costumes that accentuate their features and make them look desirable to others. Through this, they produce rituals of what should or shouldn't be worn on Halloween, like practices of purity and impurity. Cady looked at Halloween as an opportunity to dress up and embody a different identity for the night. By Gretchen and Karen’s stares of judgment and disgust toward Cady, one can see that they view her as a danger that could disrupt the order of their environment. By wearing this extravagant costume, Cady is deviating from their definition of what women should wear on Halloween. The glares they shoot at her are the actions that they take in order to project their own beliefs of what one is supposed to wear on Halloween. Though they come off in a negative manner, Gretchen and Karen are working to educate Cady on the norms that society holds pertaining to the costume choices of women. This effort to educate is a positive one, which works to uphold the order that exists within the community that exists in Mean Girls.
Comments
Post a Comment