The Construction of White, Heterosexual, Consumer Femininity in a Magazine Advertisement

Excerpts from the Paper

The Construction of White, Heterosexual, Consumer Femininity in a Magazine Advertisement
A large percentage of the images of women displayed in both women’s and men’s magazines are highly sexualized. Women are typically shown half-dressed, or in “barely there” clothing, if not entirely nude, to advertise everything from cars to alcohol to shampoo. In fashion magazines such as Cosmopolitan or Glamour women are typically photographed showing off both the clothing/ accessories they are modeling as well as their own figures. In men’s magazines such as Maxim and Details, women are used to illustrate the effectiveness of sexual techniques and products that help them pick up women. Unfortunately, the use of women as objects of sexual desire has...

..... vodka itself. In this advertisement, the woman is the focus, both visually and metaphorically; she is the goal of the man’s desires and the vodka advertised here is a means for attaining that goal through seduction, making her drunk, and possibly taking advantage of her.
Figure 1. Advertisement for
Skyy
Vodka, from Details Magazine, May/ June 2007.
Works Cited
Abelson, E. (2005). Urban Women and the Emergence of Shopping. An Introduction to Women's Studies: Gender in a Transnational World, Eds. I.
Grewal
and C. Kaplan. Columbus, OH: McGraw-Hill.
Williamson, J. (2005). Woman is an island: Femininity and colonization. An Introduction to Women's Studies: Gender in a Transnational World, Eds. I.
Grewal
and C. Kaplan. Columbus, OH: McGraw-Hill.