Discourses of Teenage Pregnancy and Teenage Motherhood as Portrayed in Philippine News Media (1973-2023)
Article
We examine the evolving discourses of teenage motherhood and teenage pregnancy in Philippine news media using Ruiz’s (2009) three-level qualitative sociological discourse analysis. Drawing from 79 news articles published in the country over a 50-year timeframe (1973 to 2023), we observe three overarching, yet non-mutually exclusive, waves of dominant discourses: (1) the Catholic moral discourse (predominant in early 1970s to late 1980s), which tended to frame teenage pregnancy and motherhood in moral terms; (2) the human capital discourse (predominantly in late 1980s to early 2000s), which appeared to reframe the phenomenon as a health and socioeconomic concern; and (3) the poverty trap discourse (predominantly in early 2000s to early 2020s), which amplified how teenage pregnancies and motherhood render young women vulnerable to cyclical poverty without self-sufficiency. We use the wave metaphor to emphasize continuity and rearticulation rather than replacement as older framings endure even as new institutional vocabularies emerge, and nascent discourses may appear within earlier periods before becoming more pronounced in later ones. Finally, we highlight the importance of critically examining these waves of discourses because they can shape societal attitudes and policies toward teenage pregnancy and teenage motherhood.
Aesthetic Pressure in Audiovisual Narratives: A Semiotic Content Analysis of South Korean and Luso-Brazilian TV Series
Article
Across Eastern and Western cultures, aesthetic norms continue to oppress women, with certain aspects transcending socio-historical differences. To visualize symbolic violence in media, we selected three series from diverse but related cultural and social contexts: South Korea’s My ID is Gangnam Beauty, Portugal’s The Good Girls Club, and Brazil’s Hidden Truths. Utilizing a qualitative and interpretive semiotic content analysis method and an intersectional decolonial feminist lens, we observe how these audiovisual media explore aesthetic norms semantically. Findings indicate that neoliberal and postfeminist discourses frame beauty practices as forms of empowerment in the three series. However, they often hide the structural forces pushing women toward unrealistic standards, with physical, financial, and psychological costs. The South Korean series explores bullying for not having hegemonic identities and bodies, and how women need to have a ‘feminine’ body to be accepted in their society. In the Portuguese series, the characters must prove themselves ‘sexy’ and capable of being valued by others. In Brazil’s series, the focus was to show how sensuality and hegemonic beauty standards continue to reinforce a collective imagination associated with success. The study raises awareness of how the media can use semiotics to promote inclusive and responsible representations of female beauty.
Revealing the Differences: Resexualization in the Textual Pluralities of Video Games
Article
Video games can be graphically or narratively overhauled through remasters, remakes, or other forms of textual pluralities to adjust to current game platforms. One of the adjustments is resexualization, narrative and mechanical transformations of bodily and gendered identities of the revisited characters. Drawing upon Gill’s (2003) resexualization of women’s bodies in media, Klein and Palmer’s (2016) textual pluralities, Purnomo et al. (2019) intertextual losses, and Krauss’ (2006) narrative negotiation on a corpus of games along with their textual pluralities, we attempted to explain resexualization in games by classifying resexualization, intertextual losses, and strategies to prevent intertextual losses. Spradleyan domain, taxonomy, componential, and cultural theme analyses were applied in the study. We formulated two types of resexualization namely resexualization type 1 (RT1) and type 2 (RT2) with the former related to gender-bending and latter to sexual objectification and de-objectification. These resexualizations trigger intertextual losses on identity and belonging. To prevent intertextual losses, three strategies are also formulated namely signaturization, alternation, and intratextualization. Game developers could employ the results of this study as a consideration when deciding to resexualize their characters in the context of textual pluralities.
Defining the halata: The social construction of the “obvious gay” in the Filipino Facebook group Samahan ng mga Halata
Article
Othering within the queer dating scene has become prevalent in recent years (Labor, et al., 2023), encapsulated by the phrase “pass sa halata,” which indicates one’s rejection of someone who is “obviously” gay. Yet the very definition of halata [obviously gay], and by extension kabaklaan [gayness], within the Philippine context is ever-changing. Through a symbolic interactionist lens, this study elucidates how the concept of the halata is being conceived and (re)defined in the Facebook group Samahan ng mga Halata [Association of the Obvious Gays], an online community which features gender-based content. From a textual analysis of 257 photos and videos posted from January to June 2024, the study’s results outline the halata’s core characteristics. The findings also indicate that while the age-old gay stereotypes of flamboyant behavior and preference for traditional masculinity persist, these become enmeshed with new and emerging definitions of queerness in the digital age, including tech-facilitated promiscuity and political awareness, thereby producing a novel image of gayness that is suspended between past and present notions of kabaklaan and is thus characterized by contradictory behavior.
Engagements and entanglements in LGBTQ+ hashtag activism: The case of online Pride celebrations in the Philippines
Article
LGBTQ+ pride celebrations in social media are opportunities for collaboration and broader participation. This study interrogates LGBTQ+ activism in X (formerly Twitter) as a functional platform for the LGBTQ+ community to mainstream its advocacy and responses to issues its members face. This research asks the question: How did X users participate in the LGBTQ+ 2021 Pride Celebration using #SulongVaklash? Guided by concepts of hashtag activism and the transnational LGBTQ+ movement, we argue that Pride Month celebrations in online spaces commemorate the event as a transnational protest movement. Findings show that X users utilized #SulongVaklash to join the global call for action to end LGBTQ+ discrimination. Further, the content of the tweets nods to the meaningful local contexts of the online protest, such as the mainstreaming of LGBTQ+ rights advocacy. Online pride protests have also allowed individuals from across the spectrum and social categories to post against discrimination and oppression in solidarity with the LGBTQ+ movement. The study concludes that X has not just become a site for protest through the discursive political appropriation of LGBTQ+ concerns but also a cyber dwelling where LGBTQ+ members recognize the value of their involvement in the fight towards recognition, acceptance, and freedom.
