Selling to soldiers: warrior hero masculinity and missing military women in Stars and Stripes’ Iraq war advertising

Abstract

ABSTRACT The Stars and Stripes newspaper is an important site for the study of gender in the US military because it has often been among the only news material available for deployed members of the armed forces at war. An analysis of advertising in Stars and Stripes during Operation Iraqi Freedom (2003–2011) found that ads constructed and privileged a commodified, warrior hero masculinity unattainable by military women. The military identity of female servicemembers was often stripped from them in advertising, though they rarely appeared at all. Where women did appear, they were often depicted as the dependent helpmate/mother, as an embodied reward for the warrior hero, or as a powerless subordinate who needs rescue or financial support from the warrior hero. Even though military women performed ably in Operation Iraqi Freedom and soon after, saw all combat specialties opened to them, the ads in Stars and Stripes reproduced, and reflected, their marginalization in the US military.