Glee

Glee is an American musical-comedy television drama that has a total of six seasons which aired from 2009 to 2015. The show has a typical American high school setting that is often seen on television and deals with a group of diverse teenagers who all connect through being in the school’s show choir. The show has not only a focus on musical performances but discusses different kinds of social issues in all kinds of forms like sexuality, gender identity or body images, as well as, things like teen pregnancy or topics related to feminism.

This gives the show an interesting balance between entertainment and serious topics. Throughout the six seasons, different main characters get introduced due to the  and them moving onwards to university. focus on the first two seasons and original of the show and its connection to stereotypes.

The show was created by Ryan Murphy, Brad Falchuk and Ian Brennan who also wrote the script for the first two seasons and acted as main directors of the show. Next to having multiple physical albums based on songs performed in the show, as well as, having had a concert tour in the US and UK in 2010/2011, the show won multiple awards like the Golden Globe Award, People’s Choice Award or Emmy.

Diversity in the world of Glee

In the show, each season represents a school year at the William McKinley High School in Lima, Ohio in which the main characters try to win the school choir competition. Next to the students love for singing, the viewer sees them dealing with their personal lives  issues like sexual and gender identity, relationships, disabilities, religion, bullying or mental health issues. While the main focus is on the students, the viewer also sees the life of some of the teachers that lead the after-school clubs the students are part of, as well as family members.

The show starts with the re-opening of the school’s choir club, also referred to as ‘Glee Club’ or ‘New Directions’, after it was closed due to its former teacher having an illegal homosexual encounter with a student. While the show discusses the personal stories and problems of each member that joins the club, the viewer gets to see a lot of singing performances which often connect to the episodes topic or specific events or feelings of the characters in the show. We see the choir trying to get ready for competition on a regional and national basis and rivalry school choirs.

The show, in general, has several main characters which all in their own way portrait a diverse individual but also often a certain stereotype or a person from a minority group. A stereotype forms when an individual’s identity gets scaled up to a national level to represent a larger group. Despite this, the show mostly focuses on a character called Rachel Berry (Lea Michelle) and later on also Finn Hudson (Cory Monteith) as her love interest.

Rachel Berry is a Jewish girl, who got adopted by a same-sex couple when she was young, and the viewer learns that her life goal is to become a broadways singer. The character of Rachel Berry seems to be one of the least diverse among the show and while others are considered an outsider due to traits they are born with, the traits of being Jewish and adopted never seem to make her one but rather her arrogant self-loving character traits. Being a typical outcast she falls in love with  popular and a bit dumb but sensitive jock, who’s interest of singing clashes with his top position of the school's hierarchy as the football team’s quarterback.

Next to that, the Glee club seems to be a community for all kinds of people, and we see different individuals from all sort of groups that portray in one or multiple ways a stereotype and/or a minority group. By the end of season two, next to Finn and Rachel, the glee club, has a gay couple, a black girl, two Asians, a boy in a wheelchair, a Hispanic lesbian, a school bad boy, a Christian girl, an obese wrestler girl, and a ‘himbo’ boy and girl who is also bisexual as their members.

Stereotypical events and in and out groups

In the world of Glee, it is easy to see the different group and sub-groups among the students due to the different after school clubs they belong in but also e play with stereotypes by the authors. The viewer does not only get a look into the community of the Glee club as the main represented club but also others due to the main characters overlapping interests. We see the popular football players and cheerleaders but also the Celibacy Club, swim team or Glee Clubs from other schools.

From the beginning of the show onwards, the Glee club is portrait as an un-popular club for which barely anyone wants to sign up for. This is common knowledge in the show and connected to a sort of ritual in form of being ‘slushied’. Being slushied is what the show calls the event of when a more popular student throws a slush at a student which happens a lot of times throughout the show and hence symbolizes being an outsider and being cut from the popular students. This shows who has a sort of power in the school hierarchical system and who does not.

While this occurs to some Glee club members from the beginning onwardsr others. Those that are used to being slushied often get annoyed by it while others that are new to it often react with anger towards the situation as they are not used to it happening and were sometimes even the ones . Getting slushied hence has the ritual meaning of becoming part of a new less popular group in the eyes of another and hence them marking the identity and group change.

As the show plays with all kinds of stereotypes the viewer also gets to see stereotypical school events. The character of Kurt Hummel (Chris Colfer) who portraits the stereotypical flamboyant  gets bullied from the beginning of the show onwards due to his appearance. In season two a scene between him and his main bully, Dave Karofsky (Max Adler), occurs in which Dave violently pushes Kurt into a locker. Kurt goes after him to confront him  develops into a fight and ends with Dave kissing Kurt and then threatening . This . 

Another example of a stereotypical storyline would the one of Glee Club member Quinn Fabray (Dianna Agron) in season one. Quinn Fabray is one of the most popular girls at school as well as the captain of the cheerleaders and the Celibate club, which is a club that promotes sexual abstinence. She grows up in a very religious family and is so herself which is shown by her actions as well as the cross necklace she is always wearing next to her cheerleader uniform.

The event occurs in which Quinn gets involved with the glee club’s bad boy and gets pregnant. Later when this is revealed to her parents, they kick her out from home. This shows not only the Christian stereotype but also a typical storyline of ‘what happens if one does not follow the rules of the bible’ connected to teenage pregnancy. It shows the bond between the Glee Club membersbecause while she gets kicked out of the Cheerlead due to her pregnancy, the Glee Club accepts it and tries to help where they can.

Throughout the occurrence of events like this in the show, the Glee Club becomes a place of acceptance no matter who you are, and they try to support each other where they can.  unique and belong to many different kinds of groups but can still get along with each other if they want to. This shows that a shared interest can help to overcome other differences people might have to focus on that one thing they share. The show deals with different social issues and hence is not only diverse in characters but also on the plotlines, creating a great balance between handling those issues and a normal high school drama scenes.

Glee

Overall, Glee is a really enjoyable show to watch that mixes musical performances with a typical high school drama show. The level of stereotyping in the show is fairly obvious but carried out well. It could be seen as a problem due it being a bit much but helps to show that a shared interest can bring together a multicultural group who might not share anything else identity-wise and are indeed very different from each other but can nevertheless accept one another despite race, sexuality, or religion.

As already mentioned Rachel is one of the least diverse characters in my eyes, this might be due to her being the main character of the show that a lot of people should be able to relate to but considering the multiculturalism of the show, I personally just found her annoying at one point and nothing to be relatable to at all and know in fact that this is not a personal opinion only.  she gets the most attention throughout the show, the writers could have focused on giving other characters more lines as they could have just been as relatable as her. Nevertheless, Glee is a show that deals with relatable teenager issues as well as general problems of all sorts, giving the viewer most likely someone they can relate to while watching. It on a lot of unusual topics or touches into them which does not just make it an enjoyable sing-along drama show but also gives it a bit of a serious touch.