The Lolita Effect: The Media Sexualization of Young Girls and What We Can Do About It (Hardcover)

~ M. Gigi Durham (Author)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

We've all seen it—the tiny T-shirts with sexually suggestive slogans, the four-year-old gyrating to a Britney Spears song, the young boy shooting prostitutes in his video game—and University of Iowa journalism professor Durham has had enough. In her debut book, she argues that the media—from advertisements to Seventeen magazine—are circulating damaging myths that distort, undermine and restrict girls' sexual progress. Durham, who describes herself as pro-girl and pro-media, does more than criticize profit-driven media, recognizing as part of the problem Americans' contradictory willingness to view sexualized ad images but not to talk about sex. Chapters expose five media myths: that by flaunting her hotness a little girl is acting powerfully; that Barbie has the ideal body; that children—especially little girls—are sexy; that violence against women is sexy; and that girls must learn what boys want, but not vice versa. After debunking each myth, Durham offers practical suggestions for overcoming these falsehoods, including sample questions for parents and children. In a well-written and well-researched book, she exposes a troubling phenomenon and calls readers to action. (May)
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From Booklist

In this intensely researched exploration of the media’s exploitation of girls, Durham exposes the links between destructive teenage self-images and the popular, highly sexed, and negative representations of girls in magazines, television programs, and movies. Considering everything from suggestive Halloween costumes for little girls to the relentless onslaught of articles about how to “get a guy” in teen publications, Durham makes her persistent way across the media landscape. Seventeen magazine in particular bears the weight of her analysis, and the results are both shocking and disturbing. By pointing to specific articles, she exposes a pattern of teaching girls to attract and please the opposite sex while minimizing serious conversations about sex or equal gender roles in relationships. In her conclusion, she asserts that this cumulative “Lolita effect” is “a major factor in the high rates of teen pregnancy and STDs in the United States and many other countries.” Durham’s provocative and erudite study of the demeaning way society views girls serves to both alarm and educate; consider it required reading for parents and their daughters. --Colleen Mondor

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 286 pages
• Publisher: Overlook Hardcover (May 1, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1590200632
• ISBN-13: 978-1590200636
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 6.2 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (15 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #269,375 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

20 of 26 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Thought-provoking but occasionally uneven, May 1, 2008

By	Sean C. Duggan (Newark, OH United States) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

I actually got my hands on a copy of The Lolita Effect about half a month ago in a bin of free books outside of a coffeehouse in Philadelphia. The copy I have is one of the unproofed galleys, so I will preface this review with the statement that some of my concerns may have already been addressed.

Overall, Durham provides some thought-provoking examples of how female sexuality is subverted by mass media and by culture. I learned of a few products I'd never heard of before (there's actually a pole dancing kit sold as a kids toy?) and was made more self-aware of existing products (I honestly hadn't given a second thought about what young girls wear these days, and was somewhat shocked to realize how sexually charged some of the sold clothing really is). She makes a good case for most of this trend being a matter of marketing rather than actually culturally ingrained. Even more useful, she includes sections at the end of each chapter on discussion topics, things which parents should talk to their children about. I've already passed my copy of the book on to a mother at my workplace who'd been complaining about how short girls' shorts had been getting. Overall, it was a good read, both engaging and informative.

The biggest problem I had with the book was one which Durham pointed out in the prologue of the book. Sex, especially when it comes to younger people, is a very polarized topic. It's hard to talk about it without being perceived as either saying "Sex is bad and you should avoid it" or "Sex is good and you should engage in it as often as possible." And, in the end, she largely avoids falling into either pole by avoiding the topic. She expresses her beliefs that sex is a positive thing, but that it should avoided until one is mature enough. When one is mature enough is, of course, never discussed and with the way she talks about rampant promiscuity, you're left with the impression that it doesn't matter how carefully you talk to your son or daughter; they're going to be engaging in sexual activities, and probably when they're too young to avoid getting damaged by it.

Ultimately, once one gets outside of the main topic of the "Lolita Effect", parts of the book get a bit uneven. As aforementioned, there's waffling on how to deal with the fact that children are engaging in sexual activity at a young age. Durham flops back and forth between the necessity of teaching children about sex at an early age and a fear of instilling in them a healthy fear for what can happen if they do engage in it. Lastly, there's a slightly annoying bit in the book where she denounces the American culture for how it's twisted sex as compared to European countries... which works until you notice that many of her statistics on increased sexual activity among children are regarding these European countries.

As I said before, these may have been fixed since the early copy I got my hands on. And, overall, it is a good read as long as you ignore the minor inconsistencies.

11 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Every mother must read this!, May 20, 2008

By	Pamela Howard (Bethesda MD) - See all my reviews

I recently came across this book and couldn't help but pick it up, being a mother of two teenage girls. Durham really approaches this topic with a fresh set of eyes, and discusses examples that we come across every day. This is a refreshingly smart look at what has (for me at least) been a really troubling issue. She talks about cultural trends without getting too academic and keeps it at a really relevant level. After reading this I feel much more comfortable discussing these things with my daughters. This is a must for anyone with young girls.

5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars A good place for parents to start the dialogue with their children: treat it as your gateway to your solution, February 19, 2009

By	Pristine Angie at www.d332.com (NYC) - See all my reviews

Media and cultural theorists and people like Roland Barthes, Erving Goffman, and John Berger have been talking about many of the media construction ideas presented here for decades. What Durham does is to do away with the academic footnotes (even helpful footnotes and comments are supplied at the end of the book) and condense it into readable chapters, each ending with helpful suggestions to get one's daughter (and son) to question and eventually, challenge the industry-constructed truths ("myths"): they will ask themselves "how is this magazine or tv ad selling this idea of conformity to me and why should I be listening to it?"

Although Rosalind Wiseman (who wrote Queen Bees and Wannabes, which the movie Mean Girls was based on) have mentioned that young girls readily buy into the blond hair blue eyed Barbie ideal, even though they instinctively know it's a ruse. At the end of each chapter, The Lolita Effect does present great conversation starters between parents and their children on discussing ways to navigate around the labyrinth of media.

The internet today has shrunk the world into a few taps of the keyboard. Therefore I think it is important to examine the "myth" on an international level. For example, Hajaruku fashion (a Japanese phenomenon) actually features a style known as Lolita Gothic. Take a casual glance at the blog entries online and you will see many American teenage girls chatting about this look as if they just saw it on their way to the store. The point Durham makes is that in our modern technological age, everything is interconnected. If a teen pop star makes a face on an internet picture in LA, some girl in South Korea is going to be forcing "round contacts" into her eyes in less than 24 hours.

And why are these bits of information being constantly shuffled around? Sex is used to confuse and suspend us in a state of distraction. But the real motivation, the author succinctly points out, is only one thing: profit. So I think one of the strongest points that Durham makes is the need for us to truncate sex from being the scapegoat. She repeats the importance of differentiating between sexualization vs. fostering positive attitudes towards sex.

There is also a helpful appendix on where readers can go (online addresses and mail addressed) to look for more resources and places for more information.

I have mixed feelings about the cover. On one hand, it is obvious that it's a play on the notion that advertising corporations use the young, thin, Western, blond-hair blue-eyed ideal to sell a product (all topics covered in the book). At the same time, the publishers of the Lolita Effect teeter on the brink of disseminating the very notion the author makes a clarion call to all her readers to challenge. No matter how you argue the point, if the image of a young, thin, blond girl with open red lips made you "notice" a product (in this case a book)...it has, in effect, propagated the Lolita Effect one more time.

I also felt a little sad that the author's first name was not presented on the cover. After expounding on the importance of teaching one's daughter to challenge the status quo, I'm sure it would have been inspiring to young female writers to think outside the box and know they themselves have a fighting chance of toppling the Lolita Effect when they see that such a thoughtful book can be penned, picked up, and published by someone not by the name of Michelle, Mary, or Megan, but Meenakshi.