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Heroic Soldier-ism: Beautified Power Asymmetry

The Swedish Armed Forces can be considered a hegemonic masculine organisation with deeply embedded patterns of patriarchy, as well as fratriarchy represented by notions of homogeneity and the male soldier. Women are highly underrepresented and face multiple double standards related to their performance of gender and more precisely performance of femininity. However, the Swedish Armed Forces claim to be an inclusive organisation and advertise this through different recruiting strategies, which display women in uniforms. This thesis uses the methodology of qualitative research by combining the methods of critical discourse analysis and critical visual analysis to analyse the representation and the performativity of gender in a recruiting advertisement for inclusivity by the Swedish Armed Forces. I argue that this advertisement led to a certain form of reproducing stereotypical notions of femininity by representing women who embody certain requirements connected to beauty standards. At the same time, notions of hegemonic masculinity and patriarchy are challenged through the representation of women in military uniforms.

Identiferoai:union.ndltd.org:UPSALLA1/oai:DiVA.org:liu-166690
Date January 2020
CreatorsNoack, Vanessa
PublisherLinköpings universitet, Institutionen för tema
Source SetsDiVA Archive at Upsalla University
LanguageEnglish
Detected LanguageEnglish
TypeStudent thesis, info:eu-repo/semantics/bachelorThesis, text
Formatapplication/pdf
Rightsinfo:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess

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