A social-semiotic approach of advertising imagery in women’s magazines
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.26563/dobras.v6i14.60Keywords:
body, heterosexuality, women’s magazines, social semiotics.Abstract
There are reasons to believe that the bodies of heterosexual women gained new prominence in today advertising and fashion magazines with the rise of a new increasingly globalized figure: the woman who asserts her femininity by portraying a sexy body – not just beautiful, but “healthy” –, freely chosen and asserted, a process presented as a source of individual empowerment, a cause for celebration, fun and pleasure. In this article I intend to return to the debate, based on a social-semiotic approach, to underline the complexity of the processes involved in the communication of such images, in the context of women’s magazines published in Portugal. It is important to understand this complexity before passing judgments on the ways such images interfere in the relationship we have with ourselves.
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