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22 
Gendered bodies
Representations of femininity and
masculinity in advertising practices
Lorna Stevens and Jacob Ostberg

Overview
This chapter introduces the topic of representations of masculinity and femininity in
advertising practices. We will show the differences between a common, taken-​for-​granted
understanding of gendered representations in advertising and a cultural perspective, which
takes the culturally and socially constructed nature of gender into consideration. We will
also demonstrate how marketing managers can choose to adopt a traditional approach or a
cultural approach to their advertising strategies in relation to gender. They may also adopt
a complacent strategy or a subversive strategy. There are therefore four choices available to
marketing managers in terms of their advertising strategies. These are traditional/​compla-
cent, traditional/​subversive, cultural/​complacent, or cultural/​subversive. We illustrate these
positions with examples from contemporary advertising campaigns. The key implication is
that the discussion invites present and future marketing managers to take a more macro and
reflective view of gendered representations. By sensitizing managers to wider macro issues,
we argue that they can make a more informed choice about whether to sustain the status quo
of conventional gendered representations (the complacent strategy) or whether to aspire to
taking a vanguard position by challenging traditional representations and thereby offering
something new instead (the subversive strategy).

22.1 Introduction
The specific marketing issue to be discussed in this chapter is representations of gen-
dered images in advertising. As consumers, we are bombarded by thousands of commer-
cial messages every day. There is simply no way to avoid being exposed to advertising,
and even if we do not necessarily buy the items that are advertised, advertising serves a
number of other important functions, which we may not always be consciously aware of.
One of the more important functions of advertising is that it provides us with a blueprint of
how to live “the good life.” Among other things, it provides us with images of how “real”
women and “real” men should be. Often, advertisements present us with repeated exposure
to representations of men and women which are stereotypical, and these stereotypes give us
an implicit assumption of how men and women really are. In particular, we would argue that
the different and often opposite ways that men and women are represented might, over time,
appear natural and self-​evident. While we might be able to critically reflect on an individual
advertisement, analyze it, and discuss its implicit values and unrealistic portrayals, the sheer
mass of commercial messages has a way of breaking through the barriers of even the most
critically conscious consumers. Consequently, advertising portrayals of gender insinuate
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360 L. Stevens and J. Ostberg

their way into our collective cultural consciousness, even our individual psyches, normal-
izing certain traits associated with “masculinity” and “femininity,” “men” and “women,”
and impacting the way we frame and define gender and sexual difference in contemporary
consumer culture.
Advertisements may reflect, sustain, challenge, or even subvert the predominant cultural
values of a society. They are myth carriers in our culture, and they may draw on symbolic
codes and metaphors to serve up ancient narratives, but often in new and exciting ways.
They hold up a mirror to society, reflecting its beliefs and values, or they challenge and
subvert the norms of society, in order to catch the attention of an intended market. Cultural
values are conveyed in advertisements through the language and imagery used in them, and
such texts communicate with us at a profound, emotional level, drawing on deep-​rooted
cultural meanings that are embedded in our shared cultural consciousness and experiences,
namely the myths, taboos, rituals, and customs that surround us.
Since advertising serves these important social and cultural functions, marketing
professionals can benefit from developing a greater awareness of the significance of these
more macro dimensions in the marketplace, and how they reflect and indeed impact on
both advertising and the consumer behavior they seek to reflect and influence. Above all,
the chapter therefore seeks to explore the dynamics of gender portrayals in contemporary
advertising. Insights into the historical, social, and cultural constructions of gender in
Western culture can be used in order to uphold the status quo by employing traditional
gender stereotypes in advertising campaigns, if one believes this to be the best way to appeal
to a target market. We will call this the complacent strategy. Both traditional (laissez-​faire)
and cultural (playful) approaches in advertising may employ this complacent strategy.
Alternatively, managers might use the power vested in the advertising industry to create
a more nuanced and complex view of masculinities and femininities, by either adopting a
traditional approach (critiquing institutions) or a cultural approach (destabilizing ideolo-
gies), in order to better reflect the realities of gender in the contemporary marketplace, or
even to strive to change perceptions and make us think about what we take for granted in
our marketing practices. We refer to this as the subversive strategy. We illustrate these two
axes in ­figure 22.1.

22.1.1 Differences between the traditional and the cultural approach

In traditional marketing, consumer culture exists “out there” and is more or less seen as a
pre-​existing structure in which the company finds itself operating. At each point in time, and
in each location, it is up to the marketing department to conjure up an attractive marketing
offer best suited to a particular target market. Most marketing management textbooks stress
the importance of marketing research and robust marketing information systems (see, for
example, any edition of Philip Kotler’s Principles of Marketing texts). Successful marketing
management is thus said to be contingent upon a sophisticated understanding of what happens
in the company’s micro and macro environment. While we do not deny that this type of know-
ledge is important, we want to challenge the sharp distinction made between the company
and the rest of the world. We particularly want to challenge the assumption that consumer
culture exists independently of individual companies. One reason for drawing attention to
this is that such a view does not place any responsibility on companies for shaping consumer
culture. More specifically, it does not place any responsibility on companies in terms of how
stereotypical depictions of gender in advertising may serve to reinforce traditional views of
what constitutes real men and women.
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Gendered bodies 361

Traditional
approach

Laissez- Critiquing
faire institutions

Complacent Subversive
strategy strategy

Destabilizing
Playful
ideologies

Cultural
approach

Figure 22.1 Alternative approaches in gendered advertising

Instead, we want to introduce a cultural approach to consumer culture and advertising.

Such a view recognizes that companies are engaged in actively co-​producing consumer cul-
ture and the norms and values associated with it. A cultural approach to advertising thus
places much more weight, and hence responsibility, on marketing managers’ capacity to
shape consumer culture. Rather than viewing consumer culture as existing “out there” as a
separate entity, a cultural approach recognizes that company activities, such as advertising,
play a part in shaping consumer culture. What we hope to offer are new approaches for
understanding advertising, and especially to critically look at portrayals of men and women.
It should be noted, however, that this sort of critical inquiry into how we portray certain
groups of people in advertising could equally be applied to other “variables” such as age
and ethnicity.

22.1.2 Managerial contribution of the cultural approach

Why should a company care about these issues, one might ask? Will it lead to higher revenue
in the short run, or even in the long run? We are not making such promises, partly because
we do not have any empirical basis to either refute or support such claims, and partly because
it is outside the aims of this chapter. Instead, we would like to draw comparisons with the
burgeoning management phenomenon of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) whereby
businesses are conducted along socially and ethically responsible lines. One could argue that
CSR is the deliberate inclusion of public interest into corporate decision-​making, and indeed
the societal marketing concept draws attention to citizens rather than consumers. Most of
the time, when such public interest is referred to, it has to do with ethics, environmental
issues, and labor rights, but we would like to add gender to this agenda. Companies aspiring
to contribute not only to their own short-​term profits and customer satisfaction, but also to
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362 L. Stevens and J. Ostberg

Table 22.1 Differences between the traditional and the cultural approach

Traditional marketing approach Cultural marketing approach

Consumer culture “Pre-​existing” as an entity separate Companies and consumer culture exist
from companies in a co-​constitutive relationship
Role of marketers Marketing activities do not play Marketing activities are co-​responsible
a significant role in shaping for creating consumer culture
consumer culture
Responsibility of None—​they merely react to Considerable—​portrayals of idealized
marketers marketing conditions gender stereotypes in advertising
impinges on consumer culture

Table 22.2 Cultural associations with notions of masculinity and femininity

Concepts associated with femininity Concepts associated with masculinity

Nature Culture
Body Mind
Instinct Logic
Passion Reason
Carnality Spirituality
Impulse Control
Consumer Producer
Emotion Discipline
Irrationality Rationality

long-​term profits and public interest and welfare should, we argue, behave responsibly in
terms of how men and women are portrayed in their marketing campaigns, as this is not only
an important strategic decision but an important ethical decision.
Marketing managers are thus faced with choices in relation to how they portray gender
in their advertising campaigns. They can either sustain gender stereotypes or offer more
pluralistic ways of looking at gender. In doing the latter, they resist serving up the same old
formulaic stereotypes of men and women. These choices acknowledge the profound influ-
ence of advertising and how it can reinforce cultural values and, by extension, consumers’
values in the marketplace.

22.2 Theoretical discussion: Gender studies and marketing

We now move on to discuss how stereotypical portrayals of men and women in adver-
tising are based on deeply-​seated gender dichotomies in culture, such as culture/​nature, man/​
woman, mind/​body, and so forth, as depicted in table 22.2. In marketing, a gender dichotomy
lies at the heart of its theories and practices. We can illustrate this by offering a brief account
of the evolution of marketing as a discipline. The marketing concept places consumers at the
center of the organization, and the traditionally accepted view of consumers in marketing
theory was that they were rational and logical human beings, with clear needs that could be
met by effective, consumer needs-​focused marketing. This focus was very much a micro-​
managerial one, with an emphasis on identifying consumers’ social, psychological, and
demographic characteristics, and then meeting their needs better than competitors.
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Gendered bodies 363

It is perhaps curious that early marketing theorists took the view that consumer behavior
and consumer buyer decision-​making revolved around a mental process of problem recog-
nition, information searching, evaluation of alternatives, and the purchase decision. After
all, the word “consumer” usually describes a physical, bodily act. Joy and Venkatesh (1994)
write that this led to the act of consumption being envisaged as a “disembodied phenom-
enon.” The wider, cultural context for this emphasis was that the mind was privileged in
Western culture. This so-​called privileging of the mind had its basis in a modernist value
system focused on a perception of man as a rational being, and it led to models of consumer
buying behavior that viewed consumers and the purchase decision-​making process as pre-
dictable, rational, and sequential.
This managerial, modernist focus neglected wider, macro environmental forces, such as
cultural, social, and political influences. Change was afoot, however. In the 1980s, new
theories of consumer behavior infiltrated the field, originating in other disciplines such as
anthropology, the humanities, and sociology. These brought with them new perspectives on
consumers. Consumers were no longer simply viewed as potential customers of products
and services that would satisfy clearly defined needs and solve specific problems. Consumer
behavior was beginning to be understood as being located in a much wider, macro context,
and it was acknowledged that it was important to consider issues of cultural, social, personal,
and gender identity.
Marketers now had a choice: They could rely on models of consumer behavior that
focused on mental processes such as cognition, rationality, and logic, or they could consider
new concepts of consumer behavior that focused on the emotions, senses, and impulses.
Certainly, it is true to say that consumers were increasingly recognized as being driven as
much by their senses as by reason, as much by their passions as by logic. Irrespective of
which perspective marketers took, experiential and hedonic aspects of consumption had now
come to the fore, and the consumer was unlikely to ever again be conceived of as a disem-
bodied problem identifier and solver! (See Holbrook & Hirschman, 1982 for a full discus-
sion of this paradigmatic shift in consumer behavior research.)
In this more “animistic” world, the human body inevitably took center stage, and the focus
on the body had important implications for how men and women were depicted in advertising.
Traditionally, men were rational customers who ultimately purchased products and services,
and women were the emotional consumers who were targeted by advertisers. This gendered
division reflected distinct and different gendered roles and responsibilities in Western society,
and furthermore these differences had a long history. In general terms, “masculinity” was
associated with the mind, logic, and rationality. Men were traditionally regarded as being
“naturally” more rational than women, and thus they had the ability to transcend their bodily
urges; women, however, were not perceived as being able to do this, and were envisaged as
being at the mercy of their bodies’ wants and desires (Joy & Venkatesh, 1994).
Women have been associated with nature, carnality, instinct, and passion since ancient
times, whereas men have been associated with culture, reason, control, and spirituality.
The feminine thus came to define emotionality, irrationality, and sensuality (Bordo, 1993).
Furthermore, womanhood had a dangerous, appetitive, and volatile nature, in contrast to
manhood, which was disciplined, rational, and controlled. Unlike men, women were there-
fore at the mercies of their mortal bodies, subject to the body’s frailties and vagaries, forever
buffeted by their feminine natures.
The traditional privileging of the mind over the body was gradually being challenged,
however. The so-​called “turn to the body” is usually associated with postmodernism.
Postmodernism is attributed with changing the focus of the consumer as a rational, knowing
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364 L. Stevens and J. Ostberg

subject to a communicative subject indulging in subjective experiences. The postmodern
consumer is characterized as having a playful attitude to the marketplace, enjoying the
games, simulations, and fun associated with being a “fragmented” consumer, leading a
“multi-​layered existence” in a liberating and limitless space, where freedom and choice is
both expected and demanded (see Brown, 1995 for a full discussion of postmodernism and
marketing). The postmodernist perspective takes a somewhat ironic view of the meaning and
value of things, questioning all that is taken for granted and respecting very little.
Postmodernism puts the body center stage, and significantly, this body is no longer a female
body. The triad of male/​producer/​mind versus female/​consumer/​body has now broken down
and become fragmented, and the old dichotomy of the marketplace has also been challenged;
some might say it has been turned upside down. Postmodernism has paved the way for new
conceptualizations, representations, and visual spectacles of both men and women in the
marketplace, and the marketplace now provides a stage for all kinds of representations of
men and women, which shake up traditional ideas about the “masculine” and the “feminine,”
about “men” and “women,” about “sexual objects” and “sexual subjects,” about the mind
and the body in consumption, and about gender roles in consumer culture. Gender blending
and gender bending have thus been thrown into the marketing communication mix alongside
traditional gender stereotyping and gender categories, and this has had surprising, challen-
ging, provocative, and at times, shocking results.
Aside from the influence of postmodernism, feminist research on the body has also been
influential in drawing attention to so-​called embodiment issues in the marketplace, challen-
ging how women are portrayed in the media. This research shows how bodies are continu-
ally molded and shaped by societal, cultural, and political forces, in order that individuals
can achieve normalization in terms of physical appearance (see Davis, 1995 for a full dis-
cussion of this). In the past four years, with the arrival of fourth-​wave feminism, we have
seen considerable change, as feminist issues such as empowerment and representation come
to the fore again. In certain circles it is now the new “norm” to address (and expose) gender
inequality and discriminatory gendered practices. This process is gathering momentum. At
the 2017 Cannes Lion Festival, the Unstereotype Alliance was formed to tackle objectifica-
tion, stereotyping, and diminishing character portrayal in the industry, and this new wave is
now being reflected in many current advertising campaigns.
In the previous section we highlighted how the values associated with femininity and mas-
culinity emerged in Western culture, briefly outlining the role of history, culture, marketing,
postmodernism, and feminism on how feminine and masculine values were mapped onto men
and women in social and cultural practices, including advertising. We have suggested that a
cultural approach and a traditional approach to advertising are at opposite ends of a continuum.
We have also suggested that there is another intersecting axis, with a complacent strategy and a
subversive strategy as the endpoints. In other words, marketing managers can choose to adopt
one of four positions: A traditional/​complacent, traditional/​subversive, cultural/​complacent, or
cultural/​subversive position (see ­figure 22.1). Furthermore, we will argue that there is a distinct
lack of subversive perspectives in marketing communication strategies. In both traditional and
cultural approaches, the dominance of the postmodern paradigm leads to either a laissez-​faire
attitude on the one hand, or a playful attitude on the other.

22.3 Femininity and masculinity in advertising

We now offer examples of how contemporary advertising deals with female and male bodies
and their representation. The “carnal feminine” offers an analysis of several advertising
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campaigns that show a return to the ancient narrative of what we describe as “the carnal
feminine,” namely the age-​old notion that women are irrational bodies who are prey to
their carnal appetites. Sometimes these ads employ postmodern irony when they represent
women in stereotypical ways and at other times, they assume a more conventional, taken-​
for-​granted tone. The second part explores how the representation of men and masculinity
in contemporary advertising campaigns are challenging, yet upholding, conventional norms.
Sexual objectification is no longer the preserve of women, it seems, but is becoming increas-
ingly prevalent in advertisements targeting men, specifically in relation to traditional taboos
about male sexuality.

22.3.1 The “carnal feminine”

The main narrative used in advertising depicts women as “consummate consumers” who are
ruled by their bodies’ appetites and are unable to resist the lure of carnal pleasures. The word
carnal is from the Latin carnalis, from caro carnis meaning “flesh.” The definition of “carnal”
is “of the body or flesh; worldly.” Its secondary meaning is also noteworthy: “Worldly, sen-
sual, sexual.” Most contemporary advertisements targeting women thus adopt what we would
define as the complacent strategy. In other words, they either adopt a traditional/​complacent,
laissez-​faire attitude in terms of gender portrayals, or a cultural/​complacent one, employing a
postmodern playfulness in relation to gender stereotypes. The traditional/​complacent laissez-​
faire position is exemplified by advertisements targeting women that emphasize women’s
animal natures, specifically their carnal appetites. This usually results in advertisements that
employ sexually suggestive and erotic narratives which emphasize experiential consumption
and sensory pleasures. The narrative is particularly overt in the advertising of products (of
which there are many) that are depicted as being endowed with the power to enable women to
experience intense physical pleasure from their consumption. Examples of product categories
that are depicted as objects of desire for women include food products such as chocolate,
ice-​cream, yoghurt and cream cheese, luxury biscuits, and toiletries and cosmetics, such as
shampoo, bath and shower products, and perfume.
Food product advertisements targeting women are usually framed within a carnal (and
often erotic) narrative, because these narratives assume that eating is women’s secret
pleasure and secret sin. The association of women’s consumption of food and toiletries with
their sexual appetites provides advertisers with opportunities to playfully explore “naughty
but nice” narratives. There is also a dark side to this, however, in that giving into the lure of
one’s appetites can lead to excessive consumption, and this may have undesirable outcomes
in our culture, notably in the form of weight gain in the case of high-​fat foods such as choc-
olate. The notion that women’s “animal” appetites are always in danger of spiraling out of
control draws on long-​standing cultural codes, as we have argued.
Bordo (1993) writes that in Western culture, women’s appetite for food, and women’s
appetite for sex are often represented as being one and the same thing. There are a number of
excellent examples of the conflation of eating and sexual suggestiveness in advertisements
targeting women, and its inherent Freudian symbolism is often used to full effect in con-
temporary advertisements. One of the most famous examples is the 1991 Cadbury’s flake
ad, which features a woman eating a Cadbury’s Flake in an overflowing bubble bath.1 Such
ads draw clear parallels between food consumption and sexual surrender. This ad is still
considered to be one of the all-​time most sexy ads.
In their study of women’s chocolate consumption, Belk and Costa (1998) write that the
consumption of luxury foods is gendered as female. They also refer to the “emotionally
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366 L. Stevens and J. Ostberg

charged” environment within which women consume chocolate (p. 189), and they highlight
the ambivalence that surrounds women’s consumption of such products. Advertisements for
chocolate address this ambivalence in their seductive and often tongue-​in-​cheek narratives
about women succumbing to the temptation of eating pleasurable, high calorie, and often
luxury food products. In another study, Lupton (1996) writes that chocolate signifies
“romance, luxury, decadence, indulgence, reward, sensuousness and femininity” (p. 35).
Chocolate advertisements, reflecting a traditional cultural norm, thus tell us that such animal
wants are “natural” in women and cannot be denied. This being the case, they are thus com-
pelled to offer women a never-​ending array of sensually, erotically, and emotionally-​charged
advertising narratives; narratives that also point to the bittersweet ambivalence that lies at
the center of such seductive appeals.
Ice-​cream is another popular product category for depicting the auto-​erotic potential of
food consumption for advertisers. One recent ad for Wall’s Cornetto range of luxury ice-​
creams features an attractive young woman on a balcony slowly consuming her ice-​cream
with a spoon while watching a handsome artist at work in the room opposite. The artist
is aware that he is being watched and becomes increasingly distracted from his work and
aroused by this spectacle. This is suggested by some auto-​erotic body stroking on his part
and a noticeable increase in perspiration! Finally, he can bear it no longer and he rushes
from the room, presumably in the direction of her apartment, judging by her knowing smile
towards the door at the end of the advertisement. In the 1990s, Wall’s launched a humorous
TV ad campaign for a new range of luxury ice-​creams in their Cornetto range called “Love
Potion.” The strapline is “Love at first bite—​steer clear of them,” and the ad shows the
wild, uncontrollable passions that can be unleashed in women by their consumption habits.
HB’s Magnum range of luxury ice-​creams called “7 Deadly Sins,” shows a woman who
is tempted by Magnum (the devil) who introduces her to her “sinful selves” and she then
embarks on her “journey” … “so many sins, so little time.” The television advertising cam-
paign features an ad for each of the seven options available in the range and shows the same
woman in seven different guises to represent each of the seven sins: Revenge, gluttony,
sloth, greed, jealousy, vanity, and lust. Words and phrases used include: “Give in,” “let go,”
“let gluttony consume you,” “succumb to true indulgence,” “indulge in the joy of sloth,”
“fulfill your heart’s deepest desires,” “you know you want to,” “tantalize yourself,” “slide
the wrapper off,” “indulge in the uninhibited pleasure of ice-​cream,” “enjoy the sensation
of decadence,” and finally, “lie back, breathe deeply, and continue to relish the sensuous
experience.” The campaign clearly draws parallels between ice-​cream consumption and
sexual surrender.
One of the most common ways of underlining women’s animalistic sides is to compare
them with animals, particularly big cats. These are used to signify women’s lustful and dan-
gerous aspects. An advertisement for Dior’s Pure Poison perfume shows a dark, predatorial
temptress who transforms herself into a black panther. Lynx toiletry products for young men
play on the idea that women have animalistic, lustful natures that are waiting to be unleashed
with the right stimulation; in this case the scent of Lynx. A recent television advert shows
wild, bikini-​clad women descending in their droves from the surrounding hills in order to
ravish (we assume) a young man on a deserted beach who has just sprayed himself with
some Lynx body spray. Interestingly, Lynx have now created a new “chocolate” scent in the
range that is depicted as being doubly irresistible for women! One particularly humorous
ad shows a life-​size chocolate virtual man being eaten bit by bit by uncontrollable women
whose desire overwhelms them to the extent that they must consume him.2 This adver-
tisement recalls ancient associations of women as devouring she-​devils who will consume
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men and ultimately destroy them, but the humor ensures that there are no overtly negative
undertones in the advertisement.
Another important dimension of women’s identification with the body in advertising is
apparent in ads that show women as a larger than life force of nature that is out of con-
trol, and “loving it.” Such representations of women in advertisements have a humorous
and playful tone, as they typically show real, believable women having fun and happily
succumbing to their animal appetites. Perhaps the best-​known example of this theme is the
long-​standing Terry’s Chocolate Orange campaign in the UK. This campaign memorably
casts the generously proportioned English comedienne and actress Dawn French as the
insatiable chocoholic who can’t control her consumption of Terry’s Chocolate Orange, and
nor does she want to! Above all, she wants to keep the pleasure of eating chocolate to her-
self: “It’s not Terry’s! It’s mine!” We are also led to assume that she is supremely indifferent
to the bodily consequences of such indulgence, and indeed, Dawn French takes a celebratory
approach to being a larger woman generally, not least by developing a range of clothing for
women with larger than average body shapes. She is a role model in English culture for a
woman of excess who delights in it, whether it is her ribald and outrageous comedy routines,
or her role as the face of Terry’s Chocolate Orange, the campaign for which reflects her own
flamboyant, comedic style.3 Dawn French embodies the garrulous, amply-​proportioned, big
woman who is ruled by her appetites and makes no apology for this. In some respects, this
could be considered to be a difficult position to take in the current climate of concern over
the rise in obesity levels in Western societies, and indeed Dawn French ceased to be the face
of the campaign in 2007, amid speculation that Terrys were responding to increasing social
pressures in this regard.
Another common strategy in advertising is to deliberately employ “porn codes” to draw
parallels between food consumption and sexual intercourse with “bad” women. These codes
are commonly used when the target markets are men. The pornographic often denotes pros-
titution and sex for sale and is rooted in the concept of domination over women. It also
commodifies the human body and persistently stereotypes male and female sexual roles
(Schroeder & McDonagh, 2004). Probyn (2000) suggests that food narratives generally
draw on the language of “soft porn” and thereby equate food consumption with sex con-
sumption. In her study she cites the “soft porn” antics of celebrity TV cooks in the UK, and
she quotes Nigella Lawson’s comments that all of us are “gastropornographers.”
The Kinder Bueno range of chocolate bars provide an excellent exemplar of the porno-
graphic in an advertising campaign, and this brand freely and unapologetically uses “porn
codes.” A TV advertising campaign in the UK memorably, and disturbingly—​given that the
product range originally targeted children—​uses such codes to personify the product as a
female prostitute. It features a male customer entering a newsagent’s shop in a dirty mac,
furtively glancing at the top shelf of the magazine racks for something to buy. His attention is
arrested, however, by the voice of a young, high-​pitched Far-​Eastern accented female voice,
who urges him to “bite me, bite me, I’ll be whatever you want me to be.” The voice comes
from a gyrating chocolate bar. The ad draws on sadomasochistic porn codes to make the
product memorable and appealing to its new target market, young adult males, and it clearly
hints at sex tourism in its narrative.
In a similar vein, a TV ad for Pot Noodles shows a man rejecting his wholesome wife’s
offer of a homemade sandwich so that he can search for “something dirty” in the local
red light district. Having been slapped by a number of indignant ladies of the night by his
requests, he eventually finds a “tart with a heart” who takes him into a dark alley, where he
finds what he’s been looking for: A Pot Noodle! More recently, a horse-​riding and hunting
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368 L. Stevens and J. Ostberg

analogy is used in this series of television ads, with references made to an upper-​class lady
(with more than a passing resemblance to Lady Chatterley from the notorious novel by D.H.
Lawrence), and her lusty gamekeeper. The campaign used a riding horn (“have you got
the horn?”) to suggest the product’s association with sexual arousal and the sex act itself.
A number of Pot Noodle ads were subsequently banned. Their most notorious campaign
used the strapline “the slag of all snacks” to underline the positioning of their product.
This strategy can be perceived as another example of the cultural perception of woman as
an insatiable consumer who lures men from the straight and narrow path. In this case she is
also the product itself, a commodity that men can’t resist. She is consumed, and, even worse,
she is a product that is bad for men’s health! The consumption of food and the consump-
tion of sex become one and the same, the common denominator being women; a body to be
consumed (for more consideration of this, see Mäkelä, Bettany & Stevens, 2018).

22.3.2 Undesirable and desirable males

Due to changes in conventions of representation of the male body, it has been suggested
that men today are being taught, or allowed, to gaze at other men either for pleasure or for
anxiety-​evoking contrast, and that this makes men increasingly aware of, and dissatisfied
with, bodies that do not meet various cultural ideals. When we are faced with admirable
bodies in visual representations, such as advertising, the subject being depicted is turned
into an admired and admirable object. While female bodies can be portrayed in the nude
without too many apologies, the nude, or partially nude, male body typically needs an excuse
to be portrayed. The men depicted need to be engaged in some activity rather than just
posing. In classical art, war scenes have been the most common excuse to portray eroticized
male bodies in action (ripped clothing, bulging muscles, sweat) with neither the subject
portrayed, nor the onlooker, having to feel uncomfortable. Today, especially in advertising,
sports seem to be the excuse of choice, as there is apparently nothing peculiar about masses
of half-​naked, well-​sculpted, sweaty bodies being seen either on sports courts, or in places
connected to sports, such as locker rooms.
Representations of men in advertising have typically been connected to men’s trad-
itional role as breadwinners, and this legacy was unchallenged up to the 1970s. During
the 1980s, however, this slowly changed, as men started appearing without references to
family—​shown alone and in close-​up. Still, men were typically portrayed as dominant and
as actionable—​in charge—​as if they were creating a sense of identity by extending out from
their body to control objects and other. In his classic study of gender in advertisements,
Erving Goffman (1979) found that women are typically represented as cradling or caressing
an object but not grasping, holding, or manipulating it in a utilitarian way. All in all, it
seems that men are active with clear purpose, whereas women just look on admiringly.
During the 1990s, men’s role as homemakers/​breadwinners was further de-​emphasized, and
contempt for stereotypically unpleasant male behaviors—​such as uncleanliness and poor
household skills—​became a staple of advertising. This open ridicule of masculinity slowly
paved the way for an increased erotization of the male body in advertising. In the 1990s
men were increasingly portrayed as objects to be looked at, without the protective shelter of
humor, degradation, or ridicule. In 1982, Bruce Weber’s image of Olympic pole vaulter Tom
Hintnaus wearing only a pair of white Calvin Klein briefs stopped traffic at Times Square in
New York, starting a series of CK underwear ads with overtly sexual representation of males
that has continued to this day. About the same time, Nick Kamen’s classic ad for Levi’s 501,
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where he undresses in a 1950s launderette, aired for the first time in 1985, is typically seen
as a shift in representations of men in TV ads.
While there have been changes in the way masculinity is portrayed in advertising, there is
still a dominance of fairly traditional modes of representation, where men are active, in con-
trol and acting upon the world—​the laissez-​faire position in ­figure 22.1. Advertisements of
this type either address or portray men in a taken-​for-​granted manner, where stereotypes of
how men behave are sustained—​such as not being comfortable taking care of babies, being
poor at expressing emotions, or being naturally unskilled at household work. There is an
abundance of these types of advertisements available. There has, however, been an increase
in the amount of advertising where men are portrayed in other, non-​traditional ways, thus
occupying the three other positions in ­figure 22.1. Most of the time, there is no real subver-
sive potential; rather we see a cultural/​complacent strategy, where a postmodern playfulness
in relation to gender stereotypes is employed, but there are tendencies towards change. Here
we will look at how men are increasingly being reminded in advertising that they might
not be living up to the beauty standards in society; the notion that they might indeed be
undesirable is thus played upon. In particular, there is the suggestion that their self-​worth
is measured by how much attention they are getting from females. This is interesting, as
the dominant masculine mode of being judged by what one does rather than by how one
looks is thus challenged. We will also look at how men are shown as objects of sexual
desire. Typically, this is described in terms of “beefcake” ads in addition to the conven-
tional “cheesecake” ads used in advertising. In all these examples, we will see how men are
portrayed as potential objects of desire, but how the ads, in more or less subtle ways, make
sure that something more can be detected. It is not merely a picture of a beautiful man or a
suggestion that men need certain products in order to be accepted. Instead, there is typically
a rational consumption choice that can be made.
Recently, there has been an increase in ads where it is suggested that the purchase of a
particular product will result in increased female attention to a man. This marks a shift, as
insecurity is inserted in the representations of men. It is no longer self-​evident, even in the
fantasy world created by advertising, that a good man will find a good woman. Advertising
targeted at women has long used this strategy and there are plenty of ads where women
are being offered various products or self-​help procedures that will help them “capture”
a man. All of a sudden, it has become increasingly common to adopt such an approach in
advertising for men. Some of the most vivid examples of these types of advertisements can
be seen in the penile enlargement industry, as discussed in detail by Östberg, 2010. There
are, however, plenty of less extreme examples, taken from mainstream advertising, pointing
towards similar tendencies.
Ever since the breakthrough advertising of Calvin Klein in the 1980s, men’s bodies have
frequently been shown in advertising as objects of desire. An example is the underwear
brand Frigo Underwear (www.frigounderwear.se) that has one of their ads featuring a man
lounging in a cane chair (­figure 22.2). He is wearing bright white underwear that stands in
stark contrast to the grey shades of color used in the rest of the picture. The man’s crotch is
in focus in the picture and the rest becomes increasingly unfocused as one’s eyes move away
from that area of his body. The man is leaning backwards in the chair, but his abdominal
muscles appear tense and flexed, as if he is about to get up from the chair. This is contrasted
by the top part of the body that seems exceptionally relaxed and at ease. The man’s mouth
and eyes are half-​open, and he is gazing lustily at something outside of the picture. Is he
waiting for someone? You perhaps? A lover? Male or female?
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370 L. Stevens and J. Ostberg

Figure 22.2 Advertisement for Frigo Underwear

These facial features, the half-​open eyes and mouth, are a common visual convention in
portraits of women as desirable objects. We thus see, in ­figure 22.2, how visual conventions
of how to portray women are transferred to the portrayal of men. This shows a cultural sen-
sitivity on the behalf of the company; they know that this will not be read negatively by the
target group. Eroticized images of men are not new to advertising, but this particular image
shows a man that is not actionable, a man that is not engaged in sports, for example, which
is the usual excuse for the exposure of partially nude male bodies.
Even though there are to-​be-​looked-​at ads featuring men, this is often regarded as being too
overt. There must typically be something more that excuses the presence of the scantily-​clad
man. In the case of Frigo Underwear, the man in the picture is not just stretched out on the cane
chair for our pleasure; he is indeed displaying a fantastic invention. The copy reads “Frigo: A
small step for man. A giant step for manhood.” Frigo Underwear is, apparently, the greatest
invention in the underwear business since Jockey invented the Y-​front in 1935. It is, according
to Frigo Underwear’s homepage “more alluring than the wonder-​bra.” The very masculine
traits of science, progression, invention, and technology function as a counterbalance to the
picture of the lounging man. The tendency to offset the picture of the lounging man with a
more goal-​directed reasoning is also found in the statement of the company philosophy:

When God created man he wanted their genitals to hang loose. The genitals were
supposed to stay cool in the gentle breeze, before, after and during the hunt for food.
But then things began to change … And then what happened to their precious genitals?
I guess you know. Sweat broke out, it rubbed and hung. But let us establish that we’re
living in a modern era and stay positive. The men who choose to wear Frigo today are
also hunting. It’s just the prey that is different.

First and foremost, we see here that the man-​as-​breadwinner ethos is restored; men are
born, even created, to hunt for food. In today’s environment when the hunting might be less
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Gendered bodies 371

eventful, the predatory instincts of men have been transferred to the hunt for a partner. The
advertising for Frigo Underwear is playing with ideas of some eternal masculine traits. Still,
despite the attempts to hide the invention of Frigo Underwear under the veil of “restoring
things to their natural state,” the real benefit of the particular model is that it gives the wearer
a more “shapely package.” The inventor apparently “… equipped his underwear with a sewn
pocket in which the whole package was placed which made it easy to ventilate and regu-
late the body temperature: All parts were kept in place and ‘voila’ he had invented the first
‘shape-​up’ for men.”
So, despite the attempts to cast the marketing of Frigo Underwear in a macho tone,
the product is geared towards the insecurities of men. And not just any insecurity, but the
most taboo of all insecurities: The insecurity of not being sufficiently well-​endowed. The
advertisers thus utilize the classic technique dispersed in most mainstream branding or
advertising textbooks: If you want consumers to act on your marketing offer, make them
insecure in their relationships with others and offer your product as the solution.
Frigo continues to play with the conventions in the next ad where they move into slightly
more subversive terrain by directly referencing the iconic 1994 advertising campaign for
Wonderbra, where Eva Herzigová is shown with the caption “Hello boys,” suggesting that
men cannot keep their eyes off a woman showing off her assets. In the “Hello girls!” adver-
tisement, it is implied that women cannot keep their eyes off a man showing off his assets.
By placing the man in such an ostentatiously objectified position, albeit with the possibility
of a tongue-​in-​cheek reading, they are using an updated version of the visual repertoire avail-
able for the depiction of men.
In these examples, we see that even when men are turning themselves into objects to be
desired by others, they are given a chance to be in control. We see here a tension between
men being insecure and the conventional way of portraying masculinity as a dominant force.

22.4 Concluding discussion: The consuming body in contemporary

consumer culture
In this chapter, we have given you a backdrop to the “brave new world” of more or less
conventional representations of femininity and masculinity in advertising. There have been
some recent changes in how men and women are portrayed in advertising, not least when
it comes to “softer” portrayals of men, such as portrayals of men interacting with children
(Grau & Zotos, 2016). In this chapter, we have focused mostly on the body, previously
represented in a very restrictive and gender-​stereotyped way, that has now been set free,
and this has opened up an arena of carnivalesque humor and previously unimaginable pos-
sibilities. Advertisers can engage in a free-​for-​all bodyfest where almost anything goes, and
postmodern irony can cover a multitude of sins. The consuming body has become a powerful
symbol of 21st-​century consumer culture, and this concept offers advertising/​marketing
practitioners the opportunity to engage in tongue-​in-​cheek theatrics, audacious feats of dare-​
devilry, slapstick comedy, and fantastic flights of fancy that amuse, provoke, move, and at
times shock their intended target audience(s), as well as those who are not their intended
target audience(s)!
One of the issues we have addressed in this chapter is that by turning to the body and post-
modernism, we are in danger of being purveyors of the same old stereotypes. No amount of
humor or tongue-​in-​cheek irony can obscure that. We need to be aware of the power issues
that lie at the core of dichotomous thinking about gender. While we have demonstrated that
change is happening in terms of how the masculine body is represented in current advertising
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372 L. Stevens and J. Ostberg

campaigns, and in terms of how women’s bodies are represented, we have also shown that
these discursive practices may often reproduce long-​ standing tendencies in marketing
strategy to trade in and on the (gendered) body insecurities of consumers. We welcome the
sea change currently underway that sees major brands now addressing issues such as diver-
sity and positive role models for men and women that are beginning to transform the con-
temporary media landscape.
This chapter does not present a step-​by-​step guide to increasing sales and profitability
for companies. We are suggesting, however, that by adopting a more critical and culturally
aware approach to the study of advertising, we can better understand where dichotomous
thinking originated, how it has evolved over time, and how it currently is manifested in
contemporary advertising practices. We have also tried to show that increasingly, male and
female bodies are represented in advertising as complex, living bodies acting in the market-
place and engaging and interacting with it, rather than stereotypical, gendered objects that
are easily manipulated by marketers. This is of course a step in the right direction. While
gender stereotypes and dualistic thinking runs deep in our society, then, we have argued that
new and more varied forms of femininity and masculinity are emerging in the marketplace.
If nothing else, we hope we have raised awareness in this chapter of an emerging process in
Western society, whereby the dualist structures surrounding masculinity and femininity are
beginning to unravel, the old monochromatic black and white lens is now being replaced by
many shades of grey, and indeed we might more accurately say that color has finally been
introduced! As marketers, we now need to rise to the challenge of turning the current idea
of the body as the seat of consumer identity into a positive one that more accurately reflects
the diversity of gendered positions and the multiplicity of gendered identities (and human
bodies!) in the marketplace.

Exercise
While it might be far from a simple and straightforward process to move from a compla-
cent to a subversive strategy regarding the use of gendered representations in advertising,
we would like to invite present and future managers to address these issues and to make a
conscious choice, rather than just opting for the easy way out, which would typically be the
laissez-​faire position. In order to think more consciously about these issues, here are some
questions that one might pose to one’s own company:

• In what ways are we presently portraying women and men—​as well as femininity and
masculinity—​in our marketing communication campaigns?
• Are we, by portraying women and men in this way, contributing to cementing stereo-
types, or are we creating positive change?
• Are there other possible ways, in which we could portray, or address, women and men
in our marketing communication campaigns?
• What would be the possible effects of portraying or addressing women and men in these
alternative ways?

Review and discussion questions

Browse the Internet, thumb through a magazine, or watch the TV and try to find examples
of advertisements that challenge the status quo of masculine and feminine representations.
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Gendered bodies 373

• In what ways do you think these advertisements have the potential to create positive
change in society?
• Are certain types of companies more likely to be successful in the marketplace with
non-​traditional representations of masculinity and femininity? If so, what are these
types of companies and why do you believe that they are more suited?
• Humor is a very effective means of gaining consumers’ attention and increasing the
likeability of a brand. It also enables advertisers to get away with “political incorrect-
ness,” for example, and push the boundaries of good taste. Do you think the end justifies
the means? What moral and ethical issues do such strategies raise?

Keywords
Gender, advertising, femininity, masculinity, body representation.

Notes
1 https://​express.co.uk/​news/​uk/​179006/​Cadbury-​drops-​Flake-​girl-​after-​fifty-​years
2 http://​theinspirationroom.com/​daily/​2008/​axe-​dark-​chocolate-​man/​
3 https://​dailymotion.com/​video/​x18donu

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