Townsend 1
Anna Townsend
CMC 100-2 Fall Semester 2010
Content Analysis:
Portrayal of Ideal Women for Certain Male Audiences
Townsend 2
Abstract:
I have composed a careful content analysis of three widely known men’s
magazines: GQ, Vibe, Maxim, and Men’s Health. Through this, I argue that by
examining the type of male each is directed towards and constructs, I can also infer
the type of women these men find ideal, and what role they play in advertising. To
construct a overview of each type of male, I pay attention to the class, age,
appearance, product, and interests that are drawn according to the types of
products advertized and the people used to advertise them. Once I establish this, I
concluded the characteristics of the ideal women for each magazine/male and their
role in the advertisements—whether their role is prominent, more backseat, or not
even relevant in appealing towards the male readers.
Townsend 3
There is no way around the construction of stereotypes; they are our brains’
way of organizing information. One walk down the magazine isle of any convenience
store displays a wide variety of magazines aimed at specific demographics that, I
argue, both rely on and construct these stereotypes. GQ, Vibe, Maxim, and Men’s
Health, four magazines aimed at varying demographics of men, construct the ideal
complementary woman. Through a content analysis of the ads from each magazine,
coded by class, age, appearance, product, and interest, we can discover more about
the types of women these men view as ideal, and how important the women’s role is
in helping the ads appeal to them.
Through an analysis of the advertisements in GQ magazine, it is evident that it
is aimed at generally young and “metro”, wealthy or wealth aspirant, urban
“business class”, white males. Media statistics show that median age of GQ readers is
33.4 years and the median household income is $81,214 (Conde Nast 2010). That is
pretty impressive considering the “household” consists of single men 65 percent of
the time. Vibe is both similar and different, and is aimed toward predominantly
black, young, wealth aspirant, males, with an emphasized interest in music and
sports. The website stated: “Vibe is the premier destination for urban music,
entertainment, culture and lifestyle for the aspirational 18-34 year old” (Vibe 0910). Interestingly enough the press kit statistics show that 49.5 percent of Vibe’s
readers are female and all readers are 71.3 percent black (Vibe Lifestyle Network
2010). Maxim targets an audience of the stereotypical white “manly-man”, with no
definite emphasis on wealth or class. In the overview, Maxim calls itself “the
unquestioned voice of men today. It’s everything men care about—cars, girls, sports,
Townsend 4
food and drink, travel—with no additives or cereal filler” (Maxim 2002). Lastly,
Men’s Health is directed toward a wider range of age (the men in the ads appeared
to vary between 20-50) and class (lower middle to upper class). It was also directed
at a variety of races (mostly black and white), and generally the active, healthaware, manly-man, who strives for a toned body. According to the media kit, the
median age of readers is 42.4 and the mission statement refers to an “audience of
active, affluent guys” (Men’s Health).
Many of the products in GQ are oriented with good hygiene. For instance,
14% of the ads fell under the category of men’s fragrance, deodorant, shampoo, or
body wash. Many of the men portrayed in these ads are clean-shaven and very far
from rugged looking; most of the time even rather gender ambiguous or displayed
in a homoerotic manner. For example, the Jean Paul Gaultier ad displays a shirtless
male with a rather seductive look. It is rather homoerotic for a male to find this ad
appealing as opposed to the Curve fragrance ad with the seductive woman (figures 1
and 7). Maxim had a few designer fragrances like those that appeared in GQ,
however, there were also the more affordable drugstore products like Old Spice
body wash, men’s Rogaine hair re-growth foam, and Schick razors and shave gels.
Men’s Health also contained the same products of different price variety, as did
Maxim. The prices of the product we buy tell a lot about wealth and the constructed
class status we like to uphold. Overall, GQ aims toward a wealthier class while
Maxim and Men’s Health covers a wider economic range.
Another common product is clothing. 34% of the ads in GQ are designer shoe
or clothing brands, and most of which are know as rather expensive like Ralph
Townsend 5
Lauren, Prada, Burberry, and Gucci to name a few. The brands of the fragrance and
clothing, as well as the formal and clean-cut appearance of the men portrayed in
these ads, are good indicators of wealthy or wealth-aspirant, middle-to-upper class,
males that GQ caters to. Watches and cars took up 17% of the ads in GQ, and
although men appeared in these ads very few times, the brands of the watches and
make of the cars themselves told enough about the wealth of the aimed audience.
While Maxim and Men’s Health also have their fair share of watch and car ads, GQ
outnumbers them in this category, even from an economic standpoint.
The modern aesthetic of the ads is also important characteristic to figure.
Many of the clothing brand ads in GQ portray this (like the gold reflective structure
in figure 3), a characteristic that expresses a modern and upper class urban vibe. For
instance, modern and sleek are looks that may appear in the setting of middle-toupper class apartments in Manhattan. The settings of the ads in Vibe however, are
mostly very plain with no distinguishable sense of place, in order to appeal to a
wider demographic that inhabits anywhere in the United States. There were only 7
out of 27 ads that had some mildly urban effect to it. Men’s Health has the most ads
with an outdoor and sometimes rural setting (18%); a classic signifier of the rugged
individualist. This also goes hand-in-hand to support the emphasis on a more active
and healthy life-style considering how running, biking, skiing, and snowboarding
(the most advertised sports) are best done outdoors. The John Travolta/Breitling
watch ad, as well as the two prescription ads, epitomizes the older demographic of
Men’s Health readers (figure 2). Travolta is portrayed as a rugged male with a
passion for aviation: he has some stubble and is wearing his blue jeans and bomber
Townsend 6
jacket. The setting is desolate and mountainous while Travolta is in the foreground
alone, leaning against his private airplane, looking stoic. This is the iconic manlyman, individualist, which is advertised in Men’s Health and reflects the reader.
One similarity I found across all magazines was that there is at least some
degree of sexualized women or products for sex. In my method for discovering the
ideal women, I pay attention to the female/male ratios, the mise-en-scene,
interaction of the different genders in the ads, how sexualized the women are, and
their appearances.
In GQ, 37% of the ads with people contain women. But they are also only
mostly shown along with men—of the 57 ads with people, only 8 contain just
women and no men. Mise-en-scene is also an important aspect here. For instance,
13 of the 21 ads containing women place them behind the men or portray them as
clinging onto the men. Most all the ads sexualize the woman as well, although not as
aggressively as in Maxim. Figure 3 is one example of this. The woman appears
scantly clad, with much of her leg and arm showing, and her position is very
sexualized. She is also wearing heels; a point that I find has been constructed to
reinforces the sexualized-woman stereotype. The woman is also placed behind the
man, and off to the side, which undermines her presence in comparison to the male
in the scene. The man is in a position of dominance, with his open-leg stance and the
camera is angled in order to make the viewer feel that they are looking up at him as
they would an idol. The Tom Ford ad is another that displays the ideal woman as
sexualized. It also demonstrates the gender ambiguity that is characteristic of the
homoerotic ads in GQ (figure 4). The man has the same pout as the woman and his
Townsend 7
features are just as feminine as the woman’s (for instance the similar jaw lines). He
is also wearing a velvet blazer and neck scarf; clothing that you surely will not find
in any of the other magazines because of their notably more-masculine and rugged
characteritics. The woman is sexualized because of her pout and lack of clothing; she
is wearing only a scarf and part of her breast is showing. Despite this, the women in
GQ are usually more slyly sexualized as opposed to the aggressive displays of scantly
clad women in Maxim. The women in the Prada ad fit the “GQ type” of women well.
They are not overly sexualized or aggressive but are still clingy in the way they latch
on to the men. Their style of dress is more sophisticated, with a modern edge, than it
is revealing. Through this analysis I figured that the ideal woman for the constructed
“GQ male” is slyly seductive, skinny, and conservative, with a modern edge in dress
and hairstyle. In Vibe, the only ads with women appeared to be directed at a female
audience, no matter how small that fraction of Vibe readers may be. Of the 17 ads
with people, 6 had women and they were all black. Interestingly enough, one of the
laundry detergent ads contained two women in the 30-40 range of age. This
contrasts greatly with the two makeup ads with Queen Latifah and the sexualized
Beyonce perfume ad (figures 5 and 6). The Beyonce ad is very sexualized with her
seductive look; and the slit in her already-short dress shows a lot of skin. Her top is
so low cut it shows all her cleavage; the copy is also written across it, drawing the
reader to focus there. Queen Latifah is not sexualized at all; the emphasis is on the
beauty of her face. This revalation, that there is no definite female type for the Vibe
male demographic, is very interesting because it is a magazine aimed at music fans
of the dominatly R & B or hip-hop genres. Many music videos of this genre in the
Townsend 8
media contain very sexualized women degraded by explicit lyrics. However this type
of female presence would not be obvious from a look at the ads in Vibe.
Although Men’s Health also has very limited female presence, the few ads it
does contain are similar to the sexualized ads in Maxim. The Curve fragrance ad
actually appeared in all the magazines but Vibe. The woman is sexualize with her
tousled hair, bustier, and seductive, lip-bite look (figure 7). The Durex condom ad;
which showed a tangle of male and fmale limbs, also appeared in both Maxim and
Men’s Health. When compared, of all the ads with people in each magazine, Maxim
had 71% with women while Men’s Health only had 23%. Although this is a drastic
difference in statistic, the two magazines generally portrayed the same sexualized,
scantly clad, and well-endowed women with long hair. If this isn’t type of female
isn’t apparent enough according to the few ads in Men’s Health, then the model
spreads that appear every througout the magazine can make up for that.
By discovering the aimed male audiences for each magazine, I discovered
their ideal female and their importance in advertisement. Philosophically speaking,
Men’s Health and Vibe tends to place woman in a back seat role. Vibe has very little
female presence, and although Men’s Health portrays the type of female similar to
Maxim, it puts more emphasis on an active Male lifestyle. With a lack of female
presence, it is difficult to conclude a certain ideal type. This is especially interesting
for Vibe because the Hip-Hop, R n’ B, and Rap style of music it advertises are the
types in media that tend to always contain sexualize women. Maxim is the other
extreme of this: women play a paramount role in the ads to sell products. In fact, the
women in the ads are key in constructing the type of male audience that the Maxim
Townsend 9
press kit admits to being. GQ, on the other hand, follows a structure in which the
women are hip accessories that aid in the construction of the certain wealthaspirant, modern, male demographic. From these observations and conclusions I
found the certain male stereotypes each magazine constructs, and their ideal
women.
Townsend 10
Figure 1:
Figure 2:
Townsend 11
Figure 3:
Figure 4:
Townsend 12
Figures 5 and 6:
Figure 7:
Townsend 13
Bibliography
Conde Nast. 2010. “Media Kit.” Accessed October 18.
http://www.condenastmediakit.com/gq/circulation.cfm
Maxim. 2002. “Overview.” Accessed November 31.
http://www.ibiblio.org/pub/electronic-publications/stayfree/ml/Maxim_2002.pdf
Men’s Health. “What is Men’sHealth.com?” Accessed November 31.
http://www.menshealth.com/mediakit/online/mission_statement.htm
Vibe. 2009-10. “About Vibe Lifestyle Network.” Accessed November 31.
http://www.vibe.com/about/contact
Vibe Lifestyle Network. 2010. “Media Kit.” Accessed November 31.
http://issuu.com/claudedupre/docs/vibe_brand_media_kit_mk2010