This research paper aims at comparing western and eastern culture based on how social media has positively influenced western women more than eastern women. The main difference between the east and the western culture is that the eastern people are known to be more conservative and traditional compared to the people in the west. This is because religion and culture have dominated the eastern culture hence, reducing the chances of eastern women to embrace the use of social media. Western women have integrated social media in their day to day lives, and this has made people appreciate the role that women play in society. People tend to hold a somewhat bleak view of women in the eastern world, particularly the Middle East. Some shared refrains might denote to the lack of freedom and burdensome female role of mothers and wife that women play. Eastern women adopting the western culture might result in disintegration and breakdown of families. The fear for unjust laws makes these women be less appreciated in society today while in contrast, western women are becoming more appreciated due to their voices on social media thus tackling gender equality issues.
Aim
More studies on gender equality in the modern world are being conducted, and this helps the researchers to understand how the importance of social media is unequal between the eastern and the western culture. Hence, an identical campaign on gender equality is being hindered by the religious and cultural beliefs adopted by the eastern world. Women in the west tend to have more opportunities due to the development programs brought by social media.
Scope and Significance
The paper will mainly look at how social media has brought more opportunities to western women than eastern women. The relationship between religion/culture and social media will be looked at. The research paper is essential since it will enable us to understand why western women have more opportunities than the eastern women do, and how gender equality can be accomplished in the modern world.
Research Question: How do religion, culture and the modern concept of social media bring a difference between the eastern and the western culture?
Limitations
There is a limited research study done on this topic. There is no clear research done on the impacts of social media that brings the differences between the eastern culture and western culture. Additionally, accessing data firsthand from the eastern women particularly in the Middle East was hard although this does not prevent the research from being carried out.
Methodology
Cross-sectional survey design will be used in this research to analyse both the quantitative and qualitative data. Both secondary and primary data will be used where the primary data will be acquired from articles and newspapers that report cases of gender inequality in the Middle East and the impacts of social media on western women. Secondary data, on the other hand, will be based on previous research papers, this will be used to look at the findings of other researchers, and it will be used to capture the statistical data and findings.
Results
This part of the research paper will focus on three themes, which include impacts of social media to the western women, gender equality across the eastern culture due to religion and cultural dominance, and how social media influences the western culture more than the eastern culture. According to Jessica, women in the western culture have firmly conveyed their presence on social media, and constitute for the majority of users on most popular sites such as Instagram. This has created opportunities where companies today are looking to reach women to be advocates, employees, entrepreneurs, and consumers (Jessica). For western women, social media helps in creating abundant opportunities that lead to innovation, effect change, and create relations across regions both locally and globally (Jessica).
The conversation states that nearly a third of Australians utilize social media in their work such as Facebook and are not concerned with being caught by their employers. 14% of the people using social media utilize it for networking purposes in the workplace while 42% of the rest use it for personal activities (The Conversation). Women in Australia have used social media campaigns to tackle gender equality issues (Heywire). The site encourages women to sign up to fight issues on sexism and stereotyping that they face. Equity and discrimination according to the Heywire was an issue ranked by young women as the top problem that affects Australia. To solve this, the social media campaign will help to display that Australian women are extraordinary. The campaign has gone ahead on creating social sites such as Twitter, Facebook, and Tumblr to post the content that they create to voice their issues. The campaign hopes that all women will be able to follow their dreams and implement what they always want to be. Hannah states that young women dominate social media platforms such as Instagram more than male. They use these sites as a magnet of fashion, beauty brands, and design, which always target women to purchase these products. Young women have dominated visual platforms, and due to the gender dynamics, women want to be recognized for their beautiful photos, and they put a significant amount of time to capture ideal shots (Ariel).
Social networking technologies tend to influence the social norms, behaviors, and attitudes of individuals (Hanson et al., 530). Social media tends to affect the behaviors of people mainly in international settings where religious traditions, culture and government recommendation play an important role especially in Iran (Young 5). Meriwether states that culture and religion have been controversial factors that have hindered the development of women in Eastern culture (43). Online platforms are regulated and limited in the eastern world to prevent women from being enlightened on the current issues of the world. Women tend to be confined in the religious doctrines and hence gender equality tends to deteriorate in the Middle East countries. Equal rights in the western world have been perpetrated by the use of social platforms and women there tend to be more empowered, and issues on gender discrimination tend to be solved amicably. The west has been emphasizing more on meritocracy, and hence, religion or culture has no place to dominate their affairs.
Conclusion
The research aimed to help us in understanding gender equality and discrimination among women and how social media positively influence women development. From the research that we undertook, it is clear that social media has helped in reducing gender inequality in the western world and this has created opportunities for women in the corporate world.
Eastern women still face cultural and religious prejudice. Thus they are still confined to gender inequality and discriminations. The online platforms such as Facebook and Twitter tend to be regulated and limited to the eastern world therefore women lack the chances of being enlightened and lack opportunities brought by social media.
Our research suggests that eastern women should embrace the use of social media to reduce the limitations of their progress. They should loosen up the religious doctrines guiding their behavior and should only select the suitable teachings from their religion that will not undermine their progress.
Reference
Ariel, D., 2012 June 27. Study:Girls more Plugged in Than Boys. Retrieved from https://slate.com/human-interest/2012/06/girls-use-social-media-more-than-boys-study-shows.html
Hannah, S., 2016 June 7. Why are More Women than Men on Instagram? Retrieved from https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2016/06/why-are-more-women-than-men-on-instagram/485993/
Hanson G, Haridakis PM, Cunningham AW, et al. The 2008 presidential campaign: political cynicism in the age of Facebook, MySpace, and YouTube. Mass Communication " Society 2010; 13:584–607
Heywire, 2014, April 30. All Women. Retrieved from https://www.abc.net.au/heywire/all-women/8970510
Jessica, F.C., 2010. Why Social Media Means Big Opportunities for Women. Retrieved from https://mashable.com/2010/02/15/social-media-women/#3jQdgeN39GqU
Meriwether, M.L., 2018. A social history of women and gender in the modern Middle East. Routledge.
The Conversation, 2012, June 20. Australians use of Facebook on the Job. Retrieved from https://theconversation.com/australians-use-facebook-on-the-job-7784
Young, Sean D., et al. "The influence of social networking technologies on female religious veil-wearing behavior in Iran." Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking 17.5 (2014): 317-321.
Appendices
Appendix A Self-Evaluation
7.1.How did we manage time and resources?
As part of our project, we had to take consideration on how we managed resources and time. When working on such a project, it is essential to have a contingency plan and manage time in case anything goes wrong. There are few methods that we utilized to manage time, and this includes Gantt chart that represented how we were going to handle our project and reflective journal, which helped us to keep in check of things that we should do and aim for the next section.
7.2.What difficulties did we experience?
We faced challenges while collecting data since there was limited research on this topic. Gathering information was tedious since getting online materials required us to purchase journals from online stores. Another challenge we faced was managing time. Although we followed the Gantt chart religiously, we took more time gathering and collecting data. Gathering feedback was difficult since not all participants were willing to share their information.
7.3.How audience have responded to our final outcome?
We created questionnaire and collected data based on the questions. Our questions posed closed questions on how social media affects women and the impacts of religion and culture towards women development. The audience were more willing to participate and each of them shared their experience and thoughts on how they felt about the topic.
