INTRODUCTION:

The consumption of cinema has a measurable influence on the perception of the audience. Women are an integral part ofany family, which comprises to form a society. It is important to know how a communication medium projects woman to the same society. Cinema is a cultural product and the film consumers administer what they interpret from films to their life (Young, 2000). Films without women character is a rare phenomenon.

It is important to look at the content of the film to know how heroines are projected to the society; Cinema is an influential medium which fascinated million across the world.Woman, girl or lady can be viewed from two aspects one as sex - female and another as gender - feminine. The aspect of sex is more of biological and the aspect of gender is based on the behavioural characteristics. Gender is an approach to divide people into separate groups; it helps people to define themselves (Diekman&Eagly, 2000).

In the psychological aspect, the act of kindness towards men shown by women is an act of fear and escapism from the unfair treatment by men. The benevolence attitude of women towards men portrays that they are emotionally stronger than women. (Glick et al., 2004) (Glick, Hilt 2000).In cinema, the good looking is always considered as the most ‎competent and successful in terms of personal and professional life. This physical attractive stereotype is very prevalent in cinema (Feingold, A., 1990, 1992). It is not simple to think like a woman in a professional world that is male dominated. Even to think and act like a woman ‎in men dominating world is difficult to connect the ideas which were left by men unconnected (Adrienne Rich, ‎‎1979).Women are stereotyped in films as it exists in the society (Haskell, 2016). The percentage of female characters are used for visual attraction is more than the male lead (Smith et al. 2014). Basically, the ideologies towards gender are persistently connected to men's preferences is attractiveness and women's preferences is towards the personal life, especially romantic partner. (Lee et al, 2010).

A study by Johnston, J., 2010, found that more women were given junior positions in their profession than men in television shows and films of the United States and the United Kingdom. The research was conducted on “Girls on screen: How film and television ‎depict women in public relations”. For this‎ a total of 126 films/series were counted and coded. The researcher found that when it comes to the role of the public relations related job, women are given only secondary level in ‎managing sector, ‎no technical works were given to women. In managing sector women hold only secretary or ‎assistant level posts, ‎managerial roles were allotted for men. Women in secretary roles were divorcees or singles, ‎middle class with white ‎skin. If women were professional practitioners, they were meant to be attractive, unmarried. The portrayal of the heroine as working woman has disappeared from popular Bollywood blockbusters. It assigns the boundary for Indian women which is home (Mishra, 2015).

From 1998 to 2016 (except 2015) women technicians in Hollywood comprises only 17%. This shows the domination of male in Hollywood (Lauzen, 2017). In one or the way, women are determined by their bodies and how ‎men treat ‎them. ‎Gender portrayal in media is asymmetrical in all the aspects of roles given to women (‏Collins, R. L., ‎‎2011; Rudy et al., 2010). In accordance with the Bandura's social cognitive theory
(Bandura, 1986), films are considered as one of the sources to achieve knowledge. That knowledge includes gender. The representation of women characters in the film is expected to influence the perception of the viewers, with respect to the gender identity. On the whole, it influences the beliefs and attitudes of the viewers towards gender roles. The visual medium serves as a model for behaviour and it influences the behaviour of a person who watches it. When women are underrepresented, stereotyped in films, viewers might reproduce the same in their real-life situation. When women were already facing inequality in the real world, the virtual world’s input might worsen the situation. Considering social proofing concept (Cialdini, 2006), viewers of the film will be persuaded by the content of the film. They may try to reproduce what they saw visually to the society they live.

The present study explores how heroines are represented in Tamil films; the aim of this study is to explore the depiction of the heroine in personal and professional life, in National Award-Winning Tamil films from 1985 to 2015.Objective of this research is to describe, heroine’s personal life portrayal in National Award-Winning Tamil films from 1985 to 2015; to describe, heroine’s professional life portrayal in National Award-Winning Tamil films from 1985 to 2015; further to analyze the trend in the portrayal of heroines in National Award-Winning Tamil films for 30 years in personal and professional life. Finally, to find whether the portrayal has any inequality.Research on women portrayal is important, though there are many researches were done in women studies with respect to mass media and communication and still some will be doing and some may start in future. This is because, each researchers’ perspective is unique and the samples and perception will definitely vary.The rationale is, knowledge about a situation is a key for any change; that knowledge will help to find a solution, framing a policy or execution of a plan. Carrying out analysis on women portrayal in films to identify the issues related to role, relations, issues such as stereotyping, objectification, underrepresentation are essential. Understanding and knowledge about women portrayal in media are crucial for societal development.

The need for the study arises as ‎to understand the representation of the heroine in personal and professional life. In the aspect of trend, this study tries to find how the progress is, whether it is functional, dysfunction or non-functional to the society; also, whether there is any inequality faced by the heroine inside and outside home.Purpose of this research is to examine in order to gain knowledge about how heroines are exhibited in the most prestigious and prominent film award of India - National Film Awards.The scope of the study includes, the findings would help to know how women are projected to the mass society, as the projection will have an impact on the audience; that impact might change their perception about women and might change theviewer’sbehaviour. The results of this research will give a clear picture about the trend. This study will be useful for the researchers who are ‎interested in films ‎studies, gender studies, and sociology. The limitations are, only National Award-Winning Tamil films from the year 1985 - 2015, under three categories, were taken for the study. The sample consists of four films. Only heroines of the films were considered for the study.

Content Analysis:

The portrayal of a woman in films has been one of the majorly scrutinised areas of content analysis with respect to mass media and communication. As this research examines how heroines are projected in the films, the content analysis will be the appropriate methodology. The audio-visual element of the films is analysed to understand the portrayal of the heroine. The research area to be studied in the portrayal of heroine is, her personal and professional life represented in Tamil films. Human coding method was also used for coding the representation of heroine in the sample films.

Sample:

Four National Award-Winning Tamil films of three categories from the year 1985 - 2015 was utilised for the study. The three categories are - NargisDutt Award for Best Feature Film on National Integration(Thalaimauraigal- 2013), National Film Award for Best Film on Other Social Issues (VedhamPudhithu - 1987) and National Film Award for Best Film on Family Welfare (Karuththamma - 1994; ThavamaiThavamirundhu - 2005).The reason behind the sample selection is, the Nation Film Award is chosen as it is the most prestigious and prominent award given by the Directorate of Film Festivals an Indian Government agency. The President of India will present the awards. These three categories of National Film Awards are selected to know how heroines are projected family level - which is the first circle for a human being;society is the next circle after the family. Many familiescomprise to form a society. Both comprise to form a nation. Therefore, by analysingthe portrayal of the heroine in National Award-Winning Tamil filmsunder these three categories will give a broaderperspective of women portrayal.

The Codebook, Coding Form, and Training:

Human coding method was used to know the portrayal of the heroine in films using eight coders. A codebook was developed to define the variables for each heroine. The following variables are considered for the present study.

To study the personal life portrayal of the heroine, the parameters used are - the personal relationship portrayal inthe romantic relationship with the hero, attachment with family and friends. Theindependence that is given to heroine in education, employment, finance.To study the personal life portrayal of heroine, the parameters used are professional relationship of heroine with boss and colleagues; The following are the parameters were used to understand both personal and professional life representation of heroine - Independence in decision making, Domination ofheroine over male, and male over heroine; Incident or Accident - heroine as victim, Incident or Accident - heroine as perpetrator, Incident or Accident - male as perpetrator, Incident or Accident - female as perpetrator;For human coding method, eight coders who are cinephiliawere selected to do coding. They were selected based on sex and age. For sex, the categories are male and female. For age, the categories are youth (15-24 years) and adult (25-64 years). Hence, in male and female categories there will be two pairs of youth and adult coders. The eight coders were from different social, economic, professional background.Also, the eight coders were selected in a way that there is no mutual connection between the coders. The identity of each coder was kept confidential from other coders.

For coding, each film was divided according to the three-act structure. The coder will code for each part for a film (Setup - act 1, Confrontation - act 2 and Resolution - act 3) in the respective coding sheets. Coding as per three-act structure is followed to know the portrayal of the heroines in detail. For a film with dual heroines, coders will code for each heroine separately for each part of the film. The variables were fully defined and explained with coding rules in a code book and training was given to the coders individually. A total of six heroines were coded in the four National Award-Winning Tamil films.

Inter-CoderReliability:

Krippendorff alpha has been used to calculate the inter-coder reliability of the data. For all the three acts in the films Vedham Pudhithu, Karuththamma, Thavamai Thavamirundhu, Thalaimauraigal, the Krippendorff alpha value of nominal and ordinal data, satisfies the customary acceptable level of α ≥ .800 (Krippendorff, 2004) (Table1).

Table 1: Inter-coder reliability - Krippendorff alpha for the collected data

(I) Inter-coder reliability - Krippendorff alpha for Vedham Pudhithu and Thalaimauraigal

Film	Set up		Confrontation		Resolution
Film	Nominal	Ordinal	Nominal	Ordinal	Nominal	Ordinal
VedhamPudhithu	α = 0.891	α = 1	α = 0.875	α = 1	α = 0. 906	α = 1
Thalaimauraigal	α = 0.890	α = 1	α = 0.907	α = 1	α = 0.894	α = 1

(II) Inter-coder reliability - Krippendorff alpha forKaruththamma, for the character Karuththamma

Set up		Confrontation		Resolution
Nominal	Ordinal	Nominal	Ordinal	Nominal	Ordinal
α = 0.847	α = 1	α = 0.846	α = 1	α = 0.856	α = 0.999

(III) Inter-coder reliability - Krippendorff alpha forKaruththamma, for the character Rosy

Confrontation		Resolution
Nominal	Ordinal	Nominal	Ordinal
α = 0.862	α = 1	α = 0.865	α = 1

(IV) Inter-coder reliability - Krippendorff alpha forThavamaiThavamirundhu for the characterSaradhaMuthiah

Set up		Resolution
Nominal	Ordinal	Nominal	Ordinal
α = 0.855	α = 1	α = 0.862	α = 1

(V) Inter-coder reliability - Krippendorff alpha forThavamaiThavamirundhu for the characterVasanthi Ramalingam

Set up		Confrontation		Resolution
Nominal	Ordinal	Nominal	Ordinal	Nominal	Ordinal
α = 0.882	α = 1	α = 0.893	α = 1	α = 0.902	α = 1

Statistical testing:

Frequency analysis was used to know the number of occurrences of values for each variable listed.

Theoretical Approach:

Theoretical concepts used for analysis are Marxist theory - base and superstructure; false consciousness and ideology. In sociology some basic concepts like alienation, anomie, class - socioeconomic, functionalism, lifestyle, status. Base and Super structure are the two basic concepts of Marxist theory, comprises a society. The base is the economic structure of the society and the superstructure is the institutions, values, and norms of that society. The superstructure of any society is built on the base of that society. The base and superstructure are neither static nor natural.False consciousness is an ideology, which was sown in the minds of the people. The ideology is what the men (ruling class) wanted everything is just the way it should be.Alienation is a feeling of estrangement and separation from others. This can happen by the person himself/herself who wants to be alienated or by the society. Anomie is a concept of rejecting the norms of the given society. A person’s socioeconomic class refers to the class level or place in the hierarchy, chain of command that exists in society. The socioeconomic class of a person can be determined by elements like education, occupation, income etc.,Something is called as functional when it contributes to the equilibrium of any institution or society. When something destructs the equilibrium of any institution or society is called dysfunctional. When something does not affect the equilibrium of the society then it is non-functional to the society. Lifestyle refers to a person's way of living, attitudes, and values. It also connects to one’s socioeconomic status. Status refers to the placement of a person in the entities of the society.

RESULTS:

Descriptive:

The plot of the four films happens in the state of Tamil Nadu. As per the plot the film Vedham Pudhithu, Thavamai Thavamirundhuroughly happens from 1970’s to mid-80 and Karuththammahappens in late 80’s and Thalaimuraigal happens around late 2000. Among the six heroines, four (Vaidhegi, Rosy, SaradhaMuthiah, Vasanthi Ramalingam) were given roles that are less important to the plot on comparing with the hero of the film. Karuththammawas given a role with more important as she played the titular role of the film. Stella was given a dispensable role in the film Thalaimuraigal. Because the plot of the film could have moved without her presence. The plot of VedhamPudhithu, Thavamai Thavamirundhu and Thalaimuraigalare male oriented and Karuththamma was female oriented. Karuththamma and Thavamai Thavamirundhu has two heroines respectively, whereas Vedham Pudhithu, Thalaimuraigal has one heroine respectively.

Heroine - The Depiction in Professional Life:

The larger portion of an Indian society has a base and superstructure that are male dominant.In the society where the plot of the films revolves, the base and the superstructure are designed by men and are androcentric. In the aspect of base - economy, only Rosyand Stella seems to enjoy financial independence. Financial independence enjoyed by other heroineswere comparatively less. Financial independence will give women a strength and empowerment (Fig.1). Employment gives financial independence to women, and it is achieved through education or knowledge about the business.In films with dual heroines, unity is found in the aspect of education. The second heroine of the film Karuththamma - Rosy and the film Thavamai Thavamirundhu- Vasanthi Ramalingam holds a professional degree - Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery (MBBS) and Bachelor of Engineering (B.E) respectively; In Vedham Pudhithu, educational qualification of Vaidhegi is not revealed in the film and Karuththamma - the heroine of the film Karuththamma is an illiterat e. Stella, the heroine of the filmThalamuraigal holds a professional degree - MBBS.

In education, among the six heroines, only three were given educational independence, they are Rosy, Vasanthi Ramalingam and Stella. Place of education was shown only for Vasanthi Ramalingam. The rest were given very low independence in education. Among the six heroines, Rosy was an adopted child and Stella was brought up in an orphanage.The rest were brought up by their parents in the film. The point to be noted is heroines who brought up at their home were not given financial and educational independence. On the other hand, heroines were not given access to their right.In employment, Vaidhegi, Saradha Muthaiah, were unemployed; Karuththamma was a milk maid. The actual working area of Rosy, VasanthiRamalingam, Stella was not shown in the film. The professional relationship of the heroine with the boss is not shown for the heroines except Stellain a scene in act 1, and the boss happens to be her husband; also, professional relationship with colleagues was not shown for the employed heroines except Stellain a scene in act 1.In professional life, heroines were either unemployed or if employed they were not given enough space to showcase their professional ability. In the aspect of socioeconomic class with reference to the professional life, male characters were portrayed in a better way than the heroine in getting access to employment and education. With reference to the professional life of the heroines, they were alienated from getting access to education and employment.Some societal norms that were framed by the men who consider them as ruling class have restricted the access of women from getting their right. The professional lifestyle andprofessional status of heroines were unable to determine as the working spot of the heroines who are employed is not shown.

In the aspect of functionalism, the portrayal of the heroine in the professional life is dysfunctional to the society. Because, heroines were not given space in the plot with reference to education and employment.

Heroine - The Depiction in Personal Life:

In family roles, some ideologies were false consciously cultivated into the mind of women belong to that society. One such ideology is, men fulfil it by being the breadwinner and women are left to take up the role of parenting and homemaking. Men who think themselves as a ruling class wanted to rule over women. Concepts like men are always better than women, and women should always be in a subordinate position to men were the propagandas sown into the women’s mind. In the personal relationship of the heroine with respect to the romantic relationship with the hero, except for Rosy and Vaidhegi, all the others have a smooth relationship with their partners. In the case of Rosy, her love for Stephen is one sided; Vaidhegi’s love for Sankarapandi was separated by their parents. Vasanthi becomes pregnant and had to elope with Ramalingam. In the romantic relationship - love, Karuththamma, Rosy, Vaidhegi, Vasanthi have faced more trouble than.

Family relationship of all the heroines was smooth though they had few troubles. Family relationship was not smooth forVaidhegi¸ as she loses her family in the film. Relationship with friends was shown only for Vasanthi and relationship with friends was not shown for other heroines. In exercising a power or influencing others over a power to control them was not shown by the females but by males. Vaidhegiwas dominated by her father which leads her to sacrifice her love; Karuththammaby her father and brother-in-law, Rosy- sister of Karuththammawas saved from female infanticide, which is an act of male domination. Saradhaand Vasanthihave faced control from their husbands. For Stella, she was under the domination of her father-in-law.

Male of the family prominently had the decision-making authority and that independence was not given to women. Exceptionally Stella took a bold decision to serve the people with her profession, but it was half-heartedly accepted by her husband. For Vaidhegi and Karuththamma they were not allowed to marry as per their wish. For SaradhaandVasanthi, decision making power lies with their husbands. There for they were alienated from making decisions related to any issues that areconcerned with the personal life of the heroine. Also, male characters were given the top position of the hierarchy in the family. The life style of heroines in personal life rely on the cast, family situation, and the environment around them. Vaidhegi’ sfollows Brahminical lifestyle. Karuththamma follows the life style of a village in Madurai, Southern part of Tamil Nadu. Rosy follows a modern lifestyle on comparing with Karuththamma. SaradhaMuthiah and Vasanthi Ramalingam leads life style of a typical homely woman of Tamil Nadu. In case of Vasanthi Ramalingam, before marriage, she leads a quite modern life on comparing with the life she leads after marriage. Stella, seems to be quite modern.

In the case, of any incident or accident heroine has never been a perpetrator but a victim. In such cases, predominantly male were the major perpetrators. In addition, for Karuththamma and SaradhaMuthiah, female characters also have involved in creating troubles. Only Rosy has not faced any incident or accident where male as the perpetrator. Heroines of the films could have been given importance in personal life and as that is lagging the portrayal of the heroine in personal life in the aspect of functionalism is dysfunctional to the society.

CONCLUSION:

This study describes professional and personal life portrayal of theheroine in National Award-Winning Tamil films from the year 1985 - 2015. From the descriptive content analysis and the frequency analysis of the human coding method (Table 3), the major findings of this research include, all the six heroines were not given equal balance in personal and professional life.From the above aspects discussed in the descriptive, heroines’ portrayal in personal and professional life, it is clear thatunderrepresentation and negative stereotyping are found through the subordinate portrayal of heroines.Though Stella gets access to education and employment, she played a dispensable role in the film Thalaimuraigal as the prominence was not given to her. Male characters who are related to women seem to get a better way of living than the heroine who always a dependent one.Male characters were prominent in creating troubles to heroines. Heroines did not dominate any male characters, but heroines have faced domination from male character and it ranges from slightto extreme. Rosy was exceptional as she was not faced any form of domination from opposite gender. There are few inequalities present in the personal life portrayal of the heroine. All the six heroines were not given access to education and among the three professionally educated heroines the only one has a biological family in the film. Heroines at home have not enjoyed financial independence. Attachment with friends was not shown for all the heroines. Decision-making power was not given to all the six. Heroines face domination at home from the opposite gender.

Heroines have faced inequality in their professional life portrayal. To start with, for any profession, education is mandatory. Among the six heroines, the educational qualification three heroines were revealed. Among the left three, one is an illiterate and the educational qualification of the other two was not shown in the film. The professional life of employed heroines was not revealed. Enjoying the financial independence due to employment was not shown. From the findings, it is clear that heroines were underrepresented in both personal and professional life portrayal in the National Award-Winning Tamil films of three categories from the year 1985 - 2015 From the analysis of the personal and professional life of heroines portrayed in the films leads to a trend which is dysfunctional to the society as the heroines were not given scope as much as the male lead characters.

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Received on 24.10.2017 Modified on 06.12.2017

Res. J. Humanities and Social Sciences. 2018; 9(1): 203-208.

DOI: 10.5958/2321-5828.2018.00036.0