Essay Sample on Katniss Everdeen: The Surprising Female Warrior of 'The Hunger Games'

Introduction

The Hunger Games is an American film set in the post-apocalyptic future where young girls and boys are chosen to fight in a televised event where they compete to their death with only one winner remaining alive. Katniss Everdeen is a female character in this film who grows to have skills and abilities, which many would consider surprising and unconventional because she is a woman. She is a female warrior who is dedicated to fighting for her life, home, and kin, which is the ideal definition of a true warrior (Ellis, 2014). Everdeen qualifies to be a female warrior because she is ready to stand up for her kin, even against more powerful and cruel opponents (Scott & Dargis, 2012). Everdeen emerges as a warrior by charting her course while remaining true to her home and Gale, her friend. She is motivated to fight for the people around despite the fact that she might lose her life in the process. As such, she selflessly gives her effort, which is the reflection of the millions of women in the society who courageously lead their life for those around her. This paper looks at the growth and the influence of her character in The Hunger Games, a form of visual sociology.

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Growth of Katniss Everdeen Character as a Female Warrior

Katniss Everdeen loses her father while she is still a young girl. This forces her to assume the role of a provider, which was traditionally her father's. She is athletic, courageous, and skilled with bow and arrows. She becomes the head of her family and takes care of her sister. She has both the traditional male and female character traits. She is both strong and nurturing (Loobeek, 2014). Everdeen's younger sister is chosen to participate in the hunger games, which risks her life. Everdeen decides to take her sister's position and fight in the game. This shows her character as a strong and courageous woman. The tragedies that befall her serve only to reveal her character as the strong and caring individual she is. Everdeen becomes a female warrior by choosing to fight for those around her despite her apparent weaknesses against her more cruel and resourceful opponents. Everdeen has both courage and love, which defines her role as a female warrior in the hunger games movie (Ellis, 2014). What even more unique on how Everdeen female warrior character is developed is that she is not presented as a sex symbol to attract the audiences. She embodies the spirit and values of a real female warrior through her strength, compassionate nature, and wits, which helps her to stay ahead even when faced by more potent male combatants (Scott & Dargis, 2012).

Influence of Katniss Character to the World

Katniss Everdeen's character is a mixture of both "feminine" and "masculine" character traits. She is singing to her younger sister and comforts her siblings when they have nightmares. These actions portray her as a caring mother figure. She also provides to her siblings, and she is good at hunting attributes that characterize her as a father figure to her siblings. Her character is used to represent roles that are played by a modern woman (Ellis, 2014). She can provide and advance in career while still being a caring and nurturing person. She serves as a role model for women who want to be strong and courageous. Her character can be used to achieve a change in society regarding the roles of women. Her character is independent and respected, this gives the large audience a role model to look up to and teaches the society to respect individuals who strive to achieve a character like hers (Ellis, 2014). More importantly, Everdeen's primary contribution to the world is the change in belief that for women to win or become triumphant, they have to exploit their body appearances and sexual appeal to become attractive and stand out (Scott & Dargis, 2012). Besides, she proves that one can be a warrior and, at the same time, compassionate and smart.

Hunger Games as Sequential Images in Visual Sociology

The portrayal of Everdeen's character is a visual sociology approach to bring to life a subject about changing gender roles that are not readily discussed by other means. Personal histories, culture, ethnicity, religion, and gender influence what the individual gets from the visual information (Harper, 2012). Viewers of The Hunger Games from different parts of the world with different religions are likely to get to a different conclusion from each other. This can result in a case where the film when viewed in some area it achieves societal change regarding the roles of the different genders, while in other regions, there is no change as a result of the film viewership (Scott & Dargis, 2012). Everdeen heroism is not played out as sexy, but she can acquire her social superiority and dominance due to her multifaceted nature. She actively undermines the sense of gender stereotypes for female dependency on men, and to mirror the social state of the society, Everdeen can hardly be used in visual sociology due to her failure to conform to the already established gender stereotypes (Scott & Dargis, 2012).

Conclusion

The film The Hunger Games is a useful application of visual sociology in the form of sequential images. The character Katniss Everdeen as a strong and caring warrior woman is used to redefine the gender roles of women. Everdeen sets a new record for female warriors due to her independence and brilliance. Her qualities and values exuded in the film set her apart from her peers by not acting on emotions but wits. More exceptional is her ability to show empathy, and she uses her feelings as a source of strength.

References

Ellis, S. (2014). Why The Hunger Games' killer Katniss is a great female role model. The Guardian, 12. Retrieved from https://www.theguardian.com/books/booksblog/2014/aug/12/why-hunger-games-killer-katniss-is-a-great-female-role-model

Harper, D. (2012). Visual sociology. Routledge. Retrieved from https://content.taylorfrancis.com/books/download?dac=C2009-0-13980-6&isbn=9780203872673&format=googlePreviewPdf

Loobeek, K. (2014). A Feminist Analysis of the Film" The Hunger Games." Concordia Journal of Communication Research, 1(1), 3. Retrieved from https://digitalcommons.csp.edu/comjournal/vol1/iss1/3/

Scott, A. O., & Dargis, M. (2012). A radical female hero from dystopia. The New York Times, 4. Retrieved from https://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/08/movies/katniss-everdeen-a-new-type-of-woman-warrior.html

Skinner, M., & McCord, K. (2012). The Hunger Games: A Conversation: Jungian and Literary Perspectives on Violence, Gender, and Character Development. Jung Journal, 6(4), 106-113. Retrieved from https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1525/jung.2012.6.4.106