Postfeminism and Advertising. Perceptions of YouTube Users on Some Femvertising Campaigns

Abstract

Femvertising is a recent pro-female advertising practice that proposes representations, values and models of behaviour to support female empowerment and, above all, to challenge the classic stereotypical advertising models of the past. The paper seeks to make a contribution to Gender and Media Studies and argues that much more detailed research is needed to critically examine the relationship between post feminism (Gill 2007a; Gill 2007b), brand activism (Ktoler and Sarkar 2020) and advertising. Hence, it has to be highlighted the urgent need to investigate what people think about ‘feminist brands’ and how femvertising can be perceived by people. Through the qualitative analysis of some YouTube comments to certain Femvertising campaigns – based on a Ishikawa’s analysis readaptation (Tipaldo 2014, 160-161) – the paper examines opinions and emotional connection to brands, but most of all it illustrates the significance of gender-sensitive communication related to advertising.

Keywords: femvertising, post-feminism, brand activism, gender stereotypes.