Impotence, Nostalgia, and Objectification: Patriarchal Visual Rhetoric to Contain Women

Abstract

Patriarchal visual rhetoric of containment, evident in contemporary media portrayals, particularly of women, systemically and institutionally oppresses women. How can women break free from the structures that restrict them? One strategy that I explore in this essay is an oppositional reading of the visual codes of containment that operate in the mass media to limit the power of non-dominant groups and attempt to force them into the strict structure of a hegemonic system. Containment visual rhetoric taps into deep-seated fears and hegemonic ideologies, including the fear that the rise of women to more powerful positions in the work force may ultimately result in the disruption or even inversion of patriarchy. From an analytic lens of visual codes of containment, I use an oppositional reading of images produced for Esquire Magazine in order to uncover ideologies of power and to discuss rhetorical strategies within patriarchal ideology intended to contain women from appearing to have agency in public spheres of influence. These three strategies are mythological impotence, cultural nostalgia, and the objectifying gaze.