Section: Gender and Communication
MEDIATIC BODY: THE MASCULINE IN ADVERTISING
Soraya BARRETO JANUÁRIO, CECL/FCSH/UNL
António Fernando CASCAIS, CECL/FCSH/UNL
Over the past four decades, society and the media have exercised both a critic’s and observer’s influence regarding the body, establishing aesthetic standards, and labelling and classifying individuals according to their physical appearance. This is based on the cult of beauty and perfection as socially understood. Cultural and gender studies, in analysing what is aired in the media, seek to understand how current norms are portrayed to society. Our research interest centres on the male body, both as object of desire and as selfrepresentation With the increasing supply of products and services designed for the masculine market, and the growing interest in the \' cult of the body \', we focus on issues of masculinity and sexuality with the purpose of understanding more precisely the advertising discourse around the male body. Our proposal is to analyze three models of advertising campaign as found in the fragrance and fashion brands of Calvin Klein, Docce & Gabanna and Jean Paul Gaultier, and as published in Portugal, between 2008 and 2010, in the lifestyle magazines, Men\'s Health, FHM and GQ. We have noted common characteristics that infer the presence of three categories, all strongly represented in those advertising campaigns. We have called them: material-body, patriarchal-body and contrast-body.
This paper focuses on an investigation of issues such as: What are the most relevant and frequent aspects of male body exposure in Advertising? How is the body exposed and portrayed in Advertising? What appropriation images of masculine models are presented in Ads? Our discussion is based on theories about the body, as established by Marcel Mauss, Michel Foucault and David Le Breton. For a perspective on studies on masculinity, we investigate the thinking of Robert Connel and Sean Nixon.