‘Seriously Girly Fun!’: Recontextualising Aesthetic Labour as Fun and Play in Cosmetics Advertising

Abstract

Femininity is work. Theoretical notions of ‘doing’ and ‘performing’ femininity have pointed to the actual labour involved in constituting identity. An integral aspect of heterosexual feminine identity labour in many cultures is beautification or the doing of beauty work. Women, as part of doing heterosexual femininity, are expected to undertake seriously aesthetic labour upon their bodies, which involves time, money, skill, effort, physical discomfort and sometimes even health risks. Beauty as labour is not a novel idea in itself; however, it is taken up within a neoliberal postfeminist culture (Gill and Scharff 2011) in newer ways. Postfeminist culture has intensified the personal aesthetic regime of women, by increasing the scope and scale of working on and perfecting the female body (Negra 2009). Allied with a consumerist ethic, greater diversity and specialisation of personal grooming services have spiralled, demanding ever-intense consumption by women. An intensification of personal grooming has entailed greater self-surveillance and discipline, as no part of the body may escape scrutiny and work. In all this, the neoliberal postfeminist subject, far from being a helpless victim, is positioned as a willing participant, whose pursuit of beauty is unrelenting and self-generated and is actively entrepreneurial in achieving her desires.