“In women's magazines femininity has always been portrayed as contingent -- requiring constant anxious attention, work and vigilance, from touching up your makeup to packing the perfect capsule wardrobe, from hiding 'unsightly' wrinkles, age spots or stains, to hosting a successful dinner party.” (Gill, 2008: 14)
Advertising has been criticized by many feminist scholars for the adverse effect it has on women and their bodies (be it psychological or physical). The women portrayed in many mainstream advertisements do not represent all the different bodies that can be classified as ‘woman’. They are constructed visual representations of women, whose femininity is linked to the strenuous upkeep of a ‘sexy body’ and appearance (hair, make-up, clothes and accessories). This has been due to the advertising industry’s increased usage of ‘commodity feminism’, a term first used by Robert Goldman in 1992, in his book Reading Ads Socially. The term refers to the ways in which advertisers attempt to “incorporate the cultural power and energy of feminism whilst
25 simultaneously neutralizing or domesticating the force of its social/political critique” (Gill, 2008: 41). This idea came to be when advertising companies realized that objectifying women might not be the best way to attract female consumers and in this way “feminist ideas began informing advertising campaigns as a way to tap into a growing market—the modern working woman” (Gill, 2008:41).
The use of ‘commodity feminism’ in advertising and the concomitant celebration of women as sexual subjects instead of sexual objects arguably inadvertently constructs a problematic femininity that, although sexually agentic, is focused on a constant and problematic concern with constructing the right look to enhance this sexual power. The formal definition of agentic is “the capacity for human beings to make choices in the world” and it views people as “self-organizing, proactive, self-reflective and self-regulating as times change” (Oxford English Dictionary), which overall shows it as having a positive meaning. The problem comes in when women and femininity are constructed in a way that links this agency with being sexually powerful for men. The problem is thus not that women have been given agency but instead the kind of agency that has been given. This presents a dilemma, as women are no longer portrayed as sexual objects but as subjects aware of their sexual power over men. Although this is perhaps to be applauded in some ways, in certain contexts this unfortunately reads as meaning that a) the only power they seem to possess is their own sexuality and b) they have to constantly measure up to standards of femininity portrayed in the media and advertising (hair, make-up, body, diet, cosmetics).
If clothes, cosmetics and hair have an influence on the right or wrong ‘doing’ of gender (following Judith Butler, 1988), then surely jewellery is part of the package. According to Russell:
“When ornamentation occurs in a patriarchal society, there is always a political slant to the act of adornment. Woman is othered through the presentation of the body, modified by adornment to connote to-be-looked-at-ness which, as a form of gender performance, both stems from and reinforces power dynamics between males and females” (2009:3)
Jewellery can therefore be seen as something that signifies a gendered body. When looking at jewellery advertisements one doesn’t have to look far to see how the body and the adornment thereof is used to relay messages of femininity or specific female role portrayals. The aim of the research has been to examine if old-fashioned feminine ideals are still present in jewellery advertising (the doting girlfriend, the mother/caregiver, the wife/home keeper) and to investigate the arrival of the figure of the sexually charged independent woman with the body that is physically and sexually attractive that is rampant today.
26 The research problem in this study is therefore the atomistic ways in which mainstream commercial jewellery advertisements seem to add negatively to the construction of the ‘feminine’ or what it is to be a ‘woman’. In light of recent feminist movements, the problem is that women continue to be seen in portrayals and roles that demarcate and diminish their agency, and that the advertising industry has the tendency to support and replicate dominant representations of women. Following Butler’s theory of gender as performance, women often rely on media representations, advertising being one such mode of representations, as reflections of the performances they should adopt. The success of these performances include the role that jewellery, as one element of adornment, should play in that performance. This role has implicitly been problematized by the various new feminist movements and the challenges made to heteropatriarchy by innovative jewellery designs and advertising campaigns.
2.1.1 Research Questions
The research question that emerges is thus to what extent and in what way do jewellery adverts in the mainstream media reflect the changing roles of society in regards to gender and the need for a different, more liberated discourse for women? This issue is becoming more highly demanded given new forms of feminism and given the increasing visibility of non-mainstream jewellery products and marketing that portray non-traditional modes of womanhood.
Primary Research Questions:
• In what manner, as compared to both third- and fourth-wave feminist theories and recent social movements in women’s rights, do mainstream commercial jewellery advertisements reinstate problematic societal gender role expectations, in particular that of the female body and femininity? In other words, how do the adverts investigated perpetuate the compulsory gender-normativity that characterizes hegemonic patriarchal conceptions of gender and sex, as well as how they reflect women’s gender performances?
How have recent advertising campaigns in non-mainstream contexts countered the reiteration and re-instatement of problematic gender role expectations?
Sub-Questions:
How do contemporary mainstream commercial jewellery advertisements intersect with feminist theories of power, ownership and sexuality?
Through what kinds of representations has mainstream commercial jewellery advertising adopted ‘commodity feminism’ qua presenting femininity as ‘owning/doing’ a sexual body and/or gaining empowerment from that sexual power?
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In what way does mainstream commercial advertising, in particular jewellery advertising, support or subvert the construction of gender expectations and roles?
What kind of mediation takes place in the adverts under exploration between the jewellery that is being advertised and the manner in which gender is portrayed within the advertisements?
What alternatives for advertising are available in non-mainstream contexts, and how do these adverts counter assumptions about gender?