Table of contentsIntroductionAnalysis of the film “Mean Girl” (essay)ConclusionIntroductionThe film I chose to watch is Mean Girls. I felt that this film accurately reflected American culture and was also widely associated with teen and high school culture. In this essay, we will research the film “Mean Girl”, the analysis of which will examine the film from two different sociological perspectives, namely the functionalist perspective and the conflict theory. The essay also discusses the film's representation of American culture and adolescent culture. The Burn Book, a crucial element of the story that contains nasty rumors about the students at the school, illustrates betrayal and lies, which is unfortunately a theme that reflects some of the darker aspects of American culture. Say no to plagiarism. Get a Custom Essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”?Get an Original Essay Analysis of the Movie “Mean Girl” (Essay)The film centers on Regina George, the high school queen, and how of which she and her two friends, Gretchen and Karen dominated their high school. They were called “plastics”. When Cady emigrated to the United States from Africa, she was enrolled in the same school as these girls and bonded with the group of friends. She was going to first try to join their group to get information about them, then return to her other friends Janice and Damian to report them. Eventually, Cady realized that she had truly become part of the "Plastics" and was a bad girl herself. The "Plastics" eventually folded and they all made new friends in new bands, but the movie mainly focused on the band's inevitable implosion and everything they did in between. The Mean Girls movie can be analyzed using functionalist and conflict theory. Today, functionalism is defined as social integration where there is a collective consciousness as a whole about society's beliefs, ideas about how a person should act and also the values ​​that have been conveyed generation after generation . In the movie Mean Girls, we can see how a group of different people make up a society with a common belief. For example, the middle girls environment is a high school where different types of students come together with the same value which is to get their education. The functionalist perspective can also be considered when there are different forms of groups. For example, the famous group which is the “Plastics” of which Régina is the leader. Unpopular students in high school conform to this popular group in the way they walk or dress just to fit in and be popular like them. This can be seen when the girls at school cut off their shirts just to follow Regina's fashion sense. No one thought his shirt was weird or laughed. Other groups like the Matheletes or the athletes make the school function normally by showing that there are always two sides which are the norm in society (Na, 2016). In the movie Mean Girls, conflict theory can also be seen. According to Karl Marx's conflict theory, the bourgeois who constitute the upper class or the owners have the power and benefit from the lower class who constitute the proletariat. In the movie Mean Girl, the conflict theory comes into play with the Plastics, who are the bourgeois, and the unpopular children who are the proletariat. The Burn Book they had where they wrote mean things about people who didn't conform to their status quo is where we can see theconflict theory. This Burn book caused a fight between all the kids at school when Regina exposed the Burn book. Janice and Damian wanted social change, including Cady when they planned to embarrass and bring down Regina, Gretchen, and Karen (Na, 2016). There is a lot of American culture represented in this film and it is all depicted from a high school perspective. . This movie has a great influence on teenagers and attracts their attention. Mean Girls is a very popular film and continues to remain relevant since 2004 when it was released, which is a major sign of its relevance. For starters, the movie focuses on the most popular girls in school, and many people in the movie call them the "queen bees." The story is about how these girls dominate the school and how everyone stands up to be liked by the girls who are so mean to everyone, especially Regina. In American high schools, teenagers thrive on being popular and well-liked because that's the most important thing to them at that time, and Mean Girls was an exaggerated representation of how far people would actually go and how much they were willing to change to be accommodated. popular. Watching Cady's transformation throughout the film was stunning. She started the film being very humble and grounded, not caring about her looks or how many friends she had, only to then push away everyone in her life other than the "plastics" and begin to worry so much about his appearance, boys. , how many people liked it, etc. Cady also expresses her shock at entering a culture she has never been in before because she has been homeschooled her entire life. This film also depicts some popular cultures where drinking, partying, and fashion were one of the main ideas of what the upper class does. Another theme of American culture represented was lying and betrayal. It's very sad to say, but American culture thrives on betraying others, lying about things, getting others in trouble in order to get ahead, and the list goes on. The Burn Book was a very influential part of history and ultimately was the downfall of the "Plastics". Regina, Gretchen, Karen, and Cady all decided to make a book in which they spread nasty rumors about students at their school that was intended so that no one could see it, but inevitably got published. When their group crashed, Regina took it upon herself to pull out the book and make it seem like she had no role; Even going so far as to put something nasty about herself in the book to appear innocent. She told the school principal that she found it in the girls' bathroom at school, but then took it upon herself to print hundreds of pages from the book and scatter them around the school, which caused an uproar. Cady ultimately decided to be the bigger person and take all the responsibility for the book. Overall, these girls would do anything to get ahead and establish themselves, just like the rest of our society. I think the meaning behind the film is very true to American society, but it's obviously just exaggerated to make a more interesting film. movie. All of the themes and messages of the film were very true to American high school culture, but they were transformed into something bigger for the film. But the movie showed the main points of the high school popularity pyramid, lies/scheming, betrayal of friends, and more. I think this film has had and continues to have a great impact on the American school system. The movie did a good job of depicting how to act and how not to do it. Thatshowed the popular girls starting out with all this fame and success in high school, but it showed the downfall of being mean to others. Their nastiness caused chaos throughout the school system and turned the school upside down. But then again, this movie also does a good job of helping high school students find more ways to bully each other. Being bullied at school is enough to make someone feel bad, but now bullying can also be brought home through social media sites. The movie was filmed in 2004, so there wasn't much social media back then, but now that social media has grown to this extent, high school students are finding other ways to implement the book to engrave online. A good friend of mine is American and has lived here all her life. When I told her about this mission and that I was going to watch Mean Girls, she told me about her high school experience and how this movie was introduced to her school. She told me that people had opened a page on the Twitter app called “Burn Book” with the name of her school. People started sending nasty things about people at his school and it got as out of control as the movie. Also, considering other sites based on the Burn Book, there is a website called Ask.Fm which was popular around 2013-2014. This site allowed people to send him anonymous messages and these messages appeared on the person's social media sites, and some messages were very hurtful. I understand the basis of the film and the dramatization of the film, but this film brought to life new ideas for students and new ways to make high school students' lives more difficult than it already is. Like I said earlier, this movie has been relevant for years and I can't see it fading away anytime soon. The more generations this film spans, the more ideas students will take from the film to make other children's lives more difficult. The film portrays everyone in a different way, but not always necessarily bad. To begin with, the men in this film didn't really play a large role in the making of the film, but when they were seen, they were pretty much candy for the 'Plastics'. For example, Aaron, who was Regina's boyfriend for part of the movie, was also very popular, but he was just seen as an accessory to Regina and eventually Cady tried to be with him as well. They also portrayed Shane, the boy Regina was cheating with, as just someone hot and brainless, somehow just being used for Regina's gain. Women were seen from many different perspectives. “Plastics” were obviously held to much higher standards than any of the other students in the book, but they portrayed the other students as something that might not be right. They showed the students bowing at the feet of the popular girls, as fighters, perhaps some were considered "air heads". There was a range of treatment meted out to the girls. There wasn't much talk about race, ethnicity, or culture, but there was something to say about sexual orientation and socioeconomic status. Damian, one of Cady's good friends when he first came to school, identified as gay and was criticized in the film because of it. Janice was his number one best friend, but she brought up several times throughout the film that he was gay and that she called him different names depending on his sexual orientation. For example, his page in the Burn Book contained a photo of himself with the caption "too gay to function." Socio-economically, Regina's family was.