Woman's image in social discoursive practices

The concept of “image” is one of the leading categories of cognition of social reality, as well as one of the integral attributes of human thinking. Communication in modern society is characterized by the expansion of the visual sphere, the deconstruction of values, the transformation of gender roles. With the development of the media space, the image of a woman acquires new connotations in the public consciousness, which indicates the relevance of the chosen problem. Within the network society, one and the same image can be presented in different interpretations, equally legitimate, despite its possible contradiction. The construction of the image of a woman in the social system is associated with discursive practices that are inherent in a particular society. Gender identity is one of the universal constructs of social reality. Identity is formed on the basis of social interaction, and representations of the image of a woman are fixed in various symbolic connections that are manifested in discursive practices. From the point of view of the theory of social construction, developed by P. Berger and T. Luckmann, reality has a combined character, including subjective, objective and institutionalized aspects. Based on this, three levels of social construction of the image of a woman in discursive practices are proposed: consecutive, performative, and narrative. At the consecutive level, the image of a woman is realized in co-existence, as in the bodily experience of being in social reality and reflects the conditions for building the horizon of the human life world. At the performative level, the image of a woman is signified by means of performative acts. The performative act reflects any linguistic action that supports or denies the existing symbolic order and thereby creates it. At the narrative level, the image of a woman is a montage of a kaleidoscope of images representing the sociocultural experience of gender meaning.