Document Type
Article
Rights
Available under a Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial Share Alike 4.0 International Licence
Disciplines
Women's and gender studies, Media and socio-cultural communication
Abstract
The menstrual product brand ‘Always’ and its #LikeAGirl campaign has made headlines for being at the forefront of a menstrual liberation, championing female empowerment and gender equality. This paper utilises a visual discourse analysis approach (Rose, 2016) to explore the discursive shifts in ‘Always’ advertisements over the past four decades. Specifically, the question as to how the construction of menstruation has changed over time in the advertising discourse of the ‘Always’ brand is addressed. Three dominant discourses of menstruation are identified: overt threat, uncontrollable and invisible. These discourses function as strong claims to truth as they reach the everyday life of female consumers playing a pivotal role in their creation of meaning.
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1080/0267257X.2021.1876752
Recommended Citation
Rachel Campbell, Olivia Freeman & Valerie Gannon (2021) From overt threat to invisible presence: discursive shifts in representations of gender in menstrual product advertising, Journal of Marketing Management, DOI: 10.1080/0267257X.2021.1876752