‘Real men score’: masculinity in contemporary advertising discourse

Abstract

ABSTRACT This study investigates the strategies employed in the representation of masculinity in a sample of 50 advertising campaigns launched between 1999 and 2020. The chosen posters advertise products targeted at men that fit into five categories: beverages, food, daily care products, male fragrances, and clothing. Among the brands advertised are American Apparel, Clinique, Coca-Cola, Dove, Givenchy, McDonald's, and Nike. The analysis of discursive strategies is complemented by an analysis of the Corpus of Contemporary American English that investigates the most salient collocates of real man/men in US English; this search was conducted due to the frequent mention of the term real men in the slogans under investigation. The corpus analysis supports the key findings of the study by showing that language and advertising operate in a circular structure and mutually impact one another. The five major strategies identified as recurrent in the representation of masculinity include gentleman's look, gender equality and fatherhood, sex appeal, sex and dominance, and strength. The findings reveal the prevalence of stereotypical representations of masculinity that foreground sex appeal, strength, and dominance over women, and to a lesser extent, the image of the classic gentleman. The Dove Men Care Collection promotes the idea of fatherhood and gender equality, which might be considered a slight departure from the usual representations of masculinity in advertising, though it is still embedded within the dominant framework of hegemonic masculinity.