55: Selling Femininity in the Wilderness: An Analysis of Social Media Representation of Women in Outdoor Recreation Apparel Companies

Presenter(s)

Emily Hung

Abstract or Description

In my paper, I seek to uncover the extent to which outdoor companies’ social media representation of women in the wilderness exploits rising themes of women’s empowerment and strength while still reinforcing patriarchal ideals and gender roles. I analyze quantitative and qualitative differences in the representation of women depicted in photos on four companies’ Instagram pages between February 1 and April 28 to capture how it changes before, during, and after International Women’s Month, while noting disparities across brands and patterns of gendered marketing. My analysis found that while women are represented more frequently on these companies' social media pages, most depictions portrayed women as passive voyeurs in the outdoors rather than risk-takers. While men were depicted passively less frequently than women, they too were depicted passively in over half of the photos for three of the four brands. Including passive depictions of men may be beneficial for men’s outdoor participation; by expanding the visual representation of men beyond the traditional, hypermasculine schema, men are exposed to a wider variety of outdoor recreation that challenge traditional stereotypes and consequently are more likely to see their interests reflected in outdoor recreation media. Conversely, women have historically lacked visibility in outdoor recreation. Thus, highly passive representation in the absence of counterbalancing active representation of women in outdoor recreation reinforces limiting sexist gender stereotypes. These disparities in how men and women are portrayed in the outdoors continue to uphold inequality in outdoor recreation participation.