Hegemonic masculinity

Ana Opris
Media and Cultural Studies, Year 2

Outline R.W Connell’s term ‘hegemonic masculinity’ and discuss its

usefulness in relation to a contemporary men’s magazine or
magazines of your choice

The last decades have brought masculinity in the attention of cultural

studies more than ever before. As pointed out by John Beynon, in the study of

masculinity “one thing has to be made crystal clear at the outset: ‘masculinity’

is composed of many masculinities [...] while all men have the male body in

common [...] there are numerous forms and expressions of gender, of ‘being

masculine’ and ‘being feminine’ (Beynon: 2002, page 1). However, within this

framework of understanding, R.W. Connell goes on to argue that at any given

time one form of masculinity is culturally dominant. In this essay we are going

to look at Connell’s articulation of the concept of ‘hegemonic masculinity’ and

discuss its relevance in relation to our contemporary society. In order to do so,

we will test Connell’s main arguments on two men’s lifestyle magazines – GQ

and Men’s Health- and try to work out whether there is an identifiable

hegemonic masculinity in these publications. This approach will enable us to

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 Hegemonic masculinity
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Media and Cultural Studies, Year 2

examine the usefulness of this notion in today’s society, as well as gain an

understanding as to what this dominant identity might be and why it might be

supported and encouraged by the media.

Connell’s formulation of hegemonic masculinity draws from the idea

that men globally have never shared the same notion of masculinity. If the sex

is biological and therefore common to all men, masculinity is cultural.

According to MacInnes (cited in Beynon: 2002, page 2) for instance, in our present

culture masculinity only exists as a fantasy about what men should be like, a

construction meant to help people make sense of their lives. Thus, “men are

not born with masculinity as part of their genetic make-up; rather it is

something into which they are acculturated and which is composed of social

codes of behaviour which they learn to reproduce in culturally appropriate

ways.” (Beynon: 2002, page 2). Within this normal state of affairs, some

representations of masculinity win consent, while others are subordinated,

absorbed or, ridiculed. Thus, hegemonic masculinities are culturally dominant

forms of gendered being, a social ascendancy achieved “within a balance of

forces”( Connell:1987)

Connell’s further arguments is that hegemonic masculinity is

constructed in relation to women and to subordinate masculinities. Thus, in a

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Media and Cultural Studies, Year 2

society still very much defined by patriarchy, hegemonic masculinity needs to

encapsulate those characteristics that would help male domination prevail.

This is why the power elites, institutions and social practices (all ruled

essentially by men) work together to uphold a certain stereotype of ideal

masculinity: “Men’s interest in patriarchy is condensed in hegemonic

masculinity and is defended by all the cultural machinery that exalts

hegemonic masculinity.” (Connell: 2005, page 23)

According to Connell, hegemony is not necessarily supported by

violence, although it may be associated with it. Rather than that, he talks about

the way in which hegemony is achieved through soft power, i.e. media

emphasis, academia, social practices, etc. This soft power works on two levels:

by ‘advertising’ a certain type of masculinity and preventing alternatives from

gaining cultural definition and recognition, “confining them to the ghettoes, to

privacy, to unconsciousness” (Connell:1987)

Hence, Connell’s theory reaches several distinct levels of society in terms

of what helps produce and reinforce hegemonic masculinity today. This being a

2000 words essay, we will have to narrow our discussion to the field of the

media, more precisely men’s magazines. Drawing from the Marxist theory

according to which “the ideas of the ruling class are in every epoch the ruling

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Media and Cultural Studies, Year 2

ideas” (K. Marx and F. Engels cited in Storey, J: 1998, page 191) and taking into account

the economic structure of the media, we can see how “elite” ideologies might

be smuggled into the texts of contemporary magazines. In an interview on his

media theory, Noam Chomsky explained the way in which the media operate

in a capitalist society: “The media will present things within a framework that

serves the interests of the dominant institutions. [...] There is a complex system

of filters in the media and educational institutions which ends up ensuring that

dissident perspectives are weeded out, or marginalized in one way or another.”

(Chomsky: 2003, page 24)

This view fits in well with Connell’s arguments on the media

reinforcement of hegemonic masculinity. However, it immediately points out a

discrepancy with his view according to which the main purpose of hegemonic

masculinity is to safeguard patriarchy. For, especially in the case of the media,

we can argue that this has more to do with economic aspects. For instance,

Edwards believes that “forms of meaning in men’s magazines have very little

to do with sexual politics and a lot more to do with markets for the constant

reconstruction of masculinity through consumption.” (Beynon: 2002, page 102)

Hence, capitalism places men in a network of social relations that

encourages sets of behaviour recognised as masculine. This view is also shared

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Media and Cultural Studies, Year 2

by Rowena Chapman, who talks about the way in which the media have

created a “new man”, more profitable for the consumer culture of the 20 th

century: “In order to sell products, advertising had to sell men, to capture them

between the covers of designer magazines.” (Champman: 1988, page 229)

Like all media, magazines have a product to sell and a market they want

to sell it to; the product is audiences and the market is advertisers. As such,

the ideal man in a magazine is not necessarily the average men in the street or,

as Connell would argue, the patriarchal ideal of a powerful figure, but that of

the most profitable male stereotype for the industry.

In order to find out more about the characteristics of this ‘ideal new

man’ in today’s society, I have carried out a content analysis on two men’s

lifestyle magazines, GQ and Men’s Health. The findings (see Appendix) of my

content analysis will enable us to apply Connell’s theory and try to indentify a

hegemonic pattern of gendered identity.

To begin with, the first section of the content analysis deals with

representations of race in the two magazines. What was considered here is the

number of images (photos) of men representing different races. The coding

sheets (see Appendix) speak for themselves, both magazines featuring

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Media and Cultural Studies, Year 2

overwhelmingly representations of white men. This suggests that the white

male ideal is still very much sustained by the two magazines.

The difference in figures is more striking in GQ , with 318 images of

white men as opposed to only 33 of black men and no representation at all of

Asian or other ethnicities. Moreover, it may be relevant to add that most of

the black men featured in the magazine are successful personalities such as

Barack Obama and Stevie Wonder, people who have already been accepted as

role models by society. The everyday black person, though, remains highly

underrepresented.

In Men’s Health the representation of race is slightly more varied, but

still far from being an actual sample of the population in this country. There

are 175 photos of white men, in advertisements as well as articles and news,

compared to 9 images of black men, 2 of Asian and 4 other (Indians and Arabs )

Of course, it could be argued that, being a magazine based mostly on sport, the

representations of race in Men’s Health acquire a distinct symbolism. As

Connell argues in his book entitled Masculinities, “In a white-supremacist

context, black masculinities play symbolic roles for white gender construction.”

(Connell: 2005, page 67) Particular black athletes may be examples for hegemonic

masculinity. Nevertheless, as was the case in GQ with the images of Obama

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Media and Cultural Studies, Year 2

and Stevie Wonder, “the fame and wealth of individual stars has no trickle-

down effect and it does not yield social authority to black men generally.”
(Connell: 2005, page 67)

The underrepresentation of other races in the two magazines points

towards a white-skin ideal. There are no negative representations of black men

and others, but rather, they are rendered invisible, excluded. As Connell

explains in Hegemonic Masculinity, this “ is a necessary condition for the

perpetuation of white male dominance, both in representation and in the

realm of the social.[...] Invisibility is both cause and effect of political and social

exclusion.” (Connell: 1987)

The second section of the content analysis deals with the nature of the

advertisements in the two publications. In GQ as well as Men’s Health, the

most frequent ads were for clothing (51), accessories (52) and cosmetics (25),

whereas traditional ‘manly products’ such as cars, booze and gadgets came out

last in the chart in terms of frequency. This points to a feminisation of

consumption within the male environment, which comes as a challenge for the

traditional male ideal that we‘ve inherited from our fathers, most of whom

would never go shopping for clothes or use beauty products.

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 Hegemonic masculinity
Ana Opris
Media and Cultural Studies, Year 2

One interpretation for this could be that masculinity and femininity

nowadays have become more fluid and they increasingly occupy a middle

space. Another explanation could well be that advertisers place emphasis on

fashion and beauty products because men are still sceptical regarding the

purchase of this kind of products and therefore they need further persuasion.

Interestingly, this section came up with a finding that could not fit any of

the pre-set categories in the coding sheet: both magazines featured 3 ads for

American Express. I found this relevant in terms of it being a direct indicator of

wealth, as well as the only banking product associated with social status. The

fact that both magazines feature the exact same 3 ads for American Express

illustrates the strong emphasis on wealth that is woven into contemporary

hegemonic masculinity.

Another important aspect is that 23 exact same advertisements are

featured in both magazines. This suggests that there are certain products that

come to be associated with masculinity and the whole idea of affluence,

putting forward the message that anyone can be like the people in the

magazines, as long as they buy the right products.

The last section of the coding sheets deals with the representation of

women. There are visibly more pictures of women in GQ than Men’s Health,

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Ana Opris
Media and Cultural Studies, Year 2

but the numbers are not high in either of the two. The images are sexualized

and in most of the cases they are featured in ads, therefore accompanying

products. In his analysis of gender in advertising, author and University of

North Texas professor Steve Craig argues that women tend to be presented as

"rewards" for men who choose the right product. He describes such

commercials as "narratives of playful escapades away from home and family.”

(Steve Craig, cited in How the media define masculinity, Media Awareness Network [Online]).

More importantly, the sexualised representation of women in the

magazines is an indicator of heterosexuality. Thus, the hegemonic masculinity

we are dealing with is essentially heterosexual. Moreover, both from the

representations of women and those of men, what comes through is the ideal

of the bachelor. There are no representations of men and women as a family,

and very few photos could be regarded as illustrations of couples.

All things considered, the magazines globally focus on matters such as

fashion, health, sports, relationships, and lifestyle. The male ideal that can be

extracted from the two publications is a handsome, white, well-built and well

dressed man. Also, they tend to target the young and affluent city man which

has the effect- intended or not- of excluding many older, rurally located or

poorer men.

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 Hegemonic masculinity
Ana Opris
Media and Cultural Studies, Year 2

Moreover, another thing that came out striking from the analysis of the

two magazines, is the fact that the ads and articles, as well as the portrayals of

men and women all work together to produce a representation of a certain

type of lifestyle. It could be argued that, besides the existence of a hegemonic

masculinity, these men’s magazines also promote a hegemonic lifestyle, based

largely on wealth and consumerism and the hedonist pursuits of a bachelor

life. Commercials offer an infantilized version of masculinity that reflects a

corporate executive’s dream customer: “a man-boy who is more likely to

remain faithful to their product than to his wife or girlfriend.” (Chaudhry, 2006) In

an article on masculinity, Chaudhry described this phenomenon as “a market-

driven consumerist culture that feeds and sustains a Peter Pan version of

masculinity.” (Chaudhry: 2006)

The ideal new man, as portrayed in the two magazines we have looked

at, seems to be the ‘metrosexual’, a man highly concerned with fashion and

defined almost entirely by his wallet; or, as Chaudhry described him, “a

collector of fantasies about the male sold to him by the media.” (Chaudhry, 2006)

Thus, according to the findings of the content analysis carried out on

two magazines, as well as the observation of different theories on masculinity,

we can conclude by saying that Connell’s notion of hegemonic masculinity is

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Media and Cultural Studies, Year 2

still relevant for our contemporary society. From the number of forms that

masculinity takes in the street today, we have indeed been able to find one

model that holds cultural hegemony in the media. The magazines we have

looked at preach a life of pleasurable consumption and advertise a man who

spends, therefore he is. This brings into light a limitation on Connell’s

argument claiming that hegemonic masculinity is a mere expression of

patriarchal pre-eminence. For it would appear that we live in a time when

hegemonic masculinity has less to do with sexual politics and more to do with

economics.

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 Hegemonic masculinity
Ana Opris
Media and Cultural Studies, Year 2

Bibliography

1. Beynon, J. (2002) Masculinities and Culture, Buckingham: Open

University Press

2. Champman, R. (1988) The Great Pretender ,Blackboard [Online].

Available at:
https://blackboard.canterbury.ac.uk/webapps/portal/frameset.jsp?
tab_id=_2_1&url=/webapps/blackboard/execute/launchr%3Ftype
%3DCourse%26id%3D_141_1%26url%3D (Accessed: 30 October 2009)

3. Chaudhry, L. (2006) ‘Men growing up to be boys’, In These Times, March

[Online]. Available at: http://www.inthesetimes.com/article/2526/
(Accessed: 29 October 2009)

1. Chomsky, N (2003) Understanding power. Edited by Mitchell, P. R. and

Schoeffel, J. London: Vintage Books

4. Connell, R. W (2005), Masculinities, Cambridge: Polity Press

5. Connell, R.W (1987) Hegemonic masculinity, [Online] Available at :

https://blackboard.canterbury.ac.uk/webapps/portal/frameset.jsp?
tab_id=_2_1&url=/webapps/blackboard/execute/launcher%3Ftype
%3DCourse%26id%3D_141_1%26url%3D (Accessed: 24 October 2009)

6. Hearn, J. (1996) Is masculinity dead? [Online] Available at:

https://blackboard.canterbury.ac.uk/webapps/portal/frameset.jsp?

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Media and Cultural Studies, Year 2

tab_id=_2_1&url=/webapps/blackboard/execute/launcher%3Ftype
%3DCourse%26id%3D_141_1%26url%3D (Accessed: 30 October 2009)

7. How the media define masculinity, Media Awareness Network [Online].

Available at: http://www.media-
awareness.ca/english/issues/stereotyping/men_and_masculinity/mascul
inity_defining.cfm (Accessed: 3 October 2009)

8. K. Marx and F. Engels, “Ruling Class and Ruling Ideas”. In J. Storey. (ed.),
1998 Cultural Theory and Popular Culture: A Reader Harlow, Essex:
Pearson

9. Robinson, S., Marked men: white masculinity in crisis, Blackboard

[Online] Available at:
https://blackboard.canterbury.ac.uk/webapps/portal/frameset.jsp?
tab_id=_2_1&url=/webapps/blackboard/execute/launcher%3Ftype
%3DCourse%26id%3D_141_1%26url%3D (Accessed: 7 November 2009)

10.Segal, L. (1990), Slow motion: changing masculinities, changing men,

London: Virago

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Ana Opris
Media and Cultural Studies, Year 2

Appendix

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Media and Cultural Studies, Year 2

Appendix 1

MAGAZINE: GQ DATE: November 2009

1) Representations of race

White men 318

Black men 33
Asian men 0
Other 0

2) Advertisements

Cosmetics (perfume, skincare) 25

Clothing 51
Shoes 18
Accessories (watches, jewellery, 52
sunglasses)
Gadgets 11
Cars 9
Booze 16
 Guns- 0
 American Express- 3

3) Articles- themes
Fashion 14
Health& care 11
Sports 5
Lifestyle 11
Politics 10
Leisure& Travel 10
Relationships 7
Success/ Personalities 15

4) Representation of women in the newspaper

In advertisements/photos 62

 23 exact same ads appear in both magazines

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 Hegemonic masculinity
Ana Opris
Media and Cultural Studies, Year 2

Appendix 2

MAGAZINE: Men’s Health DATE: November 2009

1) Representations of race

White men 175

Black men 9
Asian men 2
Other 4

2) Advertisements

Cosmetics (perfume, skincare) 30

Clothing 16
Shoes 8
Accessories (watches, jewellery, 18
sunglasses)
Gadgets 15
Cars 4
Booze 4
 Gun- 2
 American Express- 2

3) Articles- themes
Fashion 13
Health& care 36
Sports 37
Lifestyle 9
Politics 3
Leisure& Travel 9
Relationships 7
Success/ Personalities 3

4) Representation of women

In advertisements/ photos 28

 23 exact same ads appear in both magazines

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