Body Objectification

[Page 238]Body objectification is a terminology commonly used to describe the culturally sanctioned dehumanization of individuals into a fragmented assortment of sexualized body parts. This pervasive form of sexist oppression constitutes a harmful cultural practice that disproportionately targets and exacts its toll on women and girls. Sexual objectification manifests itself in myriad ways and is considered a prime socializing agent for acquisition of “the male gaze,” resulting in the virtually inevitable emergence of a bifurcated sense of self. This prevailing self-objectified lens results in girls and women internalizing a view of the self governed by an acute awareness of the value of one’s physical assets and a heightened sensitivity to how one appears and is scrutinized as an object through the eyes of male spectators. ...