REPRESENTATION OF GENDER ROLES IN FILMS: EXAMINING GENDER ROLES IN GURINDER CHADHA’S FILM BRIDE AND PREJUDICE

Gender roles suggest a social construction of a masculine and feminine order in the relationship between men and women. Judith Butler in her work Gender Trouble explains how gender roles are assumed by society as the consequence of a constituted discourse, leading to the argument that gender roles are not innate but constructed within a social discourse. Laura Mulvey in her seminal work “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema” (1975) questioned the asymmetry of power between the genders that is dominantly present in films and other visual arts. She attributes this disparity in the distribution of power and the resulting discrimination between the two genders to the presence of the male gaze. Films as a medium for expressing and representing gender roles of a given culture or society, plays a distinctive role in pop culture. This paper attempts to analyse the representation of masculine and feminine roles in Gurinder Chadha's Bride and Prejudice (2004). The film revolves around the subject of marriage and how women's role in society is determined to a large extent by this institution. The paper analyses the gender roles in the film as it navigates the theme of marriage, taking into consideration the influence of both western and eastern culture. The paper takes into consideration how traditional values and patriarchal norms affect gender roles. As Bollywood films face the challenge of true representation of gender roles, the paper also examines the extent to which this assumption applies to this film.