"Mean Girls" Analysis

Text Analysis In the popular movie Mean Girls, Lindsay Lohan plays a confused teenager struggling her way through high school hierarchy. Her character, Cady, is a transfer student that finds herself in a place where everyone is categorized in some kind of group, whether it be jocks, art freaks, or something else. Some of the cliques were seen as more powerful than others, but each had some kind of reputation. The movie can be analyzed in the Marxist perspective, wherein the text shows who is empowered and who is disempowered. What exactly do the empowered have control over? It seems that certain groups, such as the jocks and the pretty-girl-clique called “The Plastics” have an influence on the other less-empowered students at the high school. Their actions and styles were copied and commended by others. Further, The Plastics were even called, “teen royalty.” Cady’s status as a transfer student gave her the opportunity to be molded as one of The Plastics --showing her progression from a disempowered student to high school’s queen bee. In looking at the power that The Plastics possess, it can also be noted that while people tried to imitate them, people also hated them for their selfish actions. This resistance was not completely obvious as the students’ felt that the fear of being on The Plastics’ bad side outweighed their hatred. This site of struggle further emphasizes Plastic domination and hegemony. The implication is that Mean Girls is a reflection of the kind of drama that goes on in real high schools. While high school can be chaotic and dramatic, the movie showed the exaggerated extents of these concepts especially in the typical fields of high school love, popularity, and