The Cultural Limits of Challenging Hegemonic Masculinity: Critical Analysis of Online Responses to Axe Turkey Advertisements

Alparslan Nas

doi:10.5817/soc2021-2-67

Abstract

Hegemonic masculinity has been a challenging concept in cultural studies since the 1990s. Throughout the past three decades, the concept has been carefully applied to the critical analysis of gender in several academic fields, including media studies. Many studies have defined hegemonic masculinity as a locally significant and dynamic concept that is open to various interpretations across different cultural representations and experiences. This article offers a culturally specific analysis of the representations and receptions of hegemonic masculinity in Turkish advertising discourse. For this purpose, this article analyzes Axe Turkey’s two advertisements that were released for International Women’s Day in 2018. The advertisements challenged hegemonic masculinity in Turkish culture by carrying critical narratives. The advertising discourse met with a variety of audience responses through online comments. Content analysis of the online responses revealed a dominant trend in the audiences towards restoring the hegemonic masculine order by applying several discursive strategies against the advertising narrative.

Highlights

Hegemonic masculinity has been a challenging concept in cultural studies since the 1990s
There have been many advertising campaigns supporting women’s empowerment in Turkey, Axe’s campaign is unique in terms of focusing on men’s guilt and calling for self-criticism and apology, which tend to shatter the cultural foundations of hegemonic masculinity
Axe’s two advertisements released for International Women’s Day in Turkey point out the openness of the advertising text to which the audiences relate itself with different discursive strategies

Summary

Masculinities in Advertising Discourse

In their article “Hegemonic Masculinity: Rethinking the Concept”, Connell and Messerschmidt (2005: 849) develop the notion of hegemonic masculinity by pointing out the diverse ways in which masculinities are reproduced in local, regional and global contexts. Beasley (2008: 96) argues that hegemonic masculinity can be critically evaluated as a “political ideal” on the level of discourse, in response to Connell’s insistence that hegemonic masculinity is a practice reflected in the material domain of social experience In this respect, advertisements constitute a major discursive technology that is capable of participating in the power struggles through regionally and globally located narratives. The third category of scholarly interest draws attention to the discursive strategies employed in the advertisements which challenge and, at the same time, paradoxically reproduce hegemonic masculinity Studies in this category analyze the advertisements, media items, and daily life practices by pointing to their ambiguities and limitations to offer a liberating discourse that is capable of challenging hegemonic masculinity by referring to the process of “masculinizing” (Greenebaum and Dexter 2018; Hardin et al 2009; Klasson and Ulver 2015; Leader 2019; Scheibling and Lafrance 2019). This article will engage in the critical analysis of Axe’s latest advertisements to examine the discursive contest between the brand and its audiences

Note on Methodology

Where were you before?

Findings

Discursive Restoration of Hegemonic Masculine Order