A New Body Image for Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Edition

 A New Body Image for Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Edition

By Dee Roberts

Cheryl, Elle, Tyra, Heidi, and Christie. These are just some of the iconic women that have graced the cover of the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Edition through the years. Looking through the 54 covers, it did not shock me how unalike the covers were in the sixties and seventies as opposed to the past ten years. Since the original Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Edition cover debuted in 1964, the covers have gotten more provocative and the models have become slimmer, validating the idea that in order for women to be desirable in today’s culture you have to have a small fit and firm figure with just the right amount of curves. However this year, something different happened. It was not a Hannah Davis or Irina Shayk cover. Sports Illustrated did something they had never done before and displayed three Cover Models. What was so groundbreaking about this announcement? These three women were representing all different body shapes, not just one.   This version of the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Edition displaying three different cover models of different shapes and sizes demonstrates how our culture is making strides to lower the high standard for women’s bodies.

                          

(1970 Cover Model Cheryl Tiegs and 2015 cover model Hannah Davis (Time.com))

The 2016 Cover Models include: UFC fighter Ronda Rousey, model Ashley Graham and model Hailey Clauson. Due to the fact that Ashley Graham is categorized as a plus size model and had only been featured in the magazine in an advertisement the previous year, drew the publication the most buzz. The magazine’s Assistant Managing Editor MJ Day came out with a statement explaining that, “the three covers of Hailey, Ronda and Ashley celebrate the SI Swimsuit. All three women are beautiful, sexy and strong. Beauty is not cookie cutter. Beauty is not one size fits all. Beauty is all around us and that became especially obvious to me while shooting and editing this year’s issue” (Sports Illustrated, 1).

                       

(2016 Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Cover Models (SportsIllustrated.com))

Typically when we think of Sports Illustrated we think of the picture perfect models who have the ideal bodies that young girls and women aspire to have. It has been magazine’s like The Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Edition that imbeds this idea in not only the minds of women, but in the minds of men as well that this is what desirable women should look like. In Susan Bordo’s “Reading the Slender Body”, she discusses how we are exposed to homogenizing imagery, meaning that everything looks the same therefore we begin to believe that is the norm (Bordo).

According to About-Face, an organization that equips women and girls with tools to understand and resist harmful media messages that affect their self-esteem and body images, defines body image as the way we perceive our own bodies and the way we assume other people perceive us (About-Face,1). Television, movies, and advertisements use attractive and thin women to represent what we should look like and to represent what men are most attracted to. Constantly seeing one body type representing the ideal and desired body for women causes anyone who strays from that norm to feel as though they do not belong. Again referencing “Reading the Slender Body,” Susan Bordo goes onto state that, “Indeed, such preoccupation may function as one of the most powerful normalizing mechanisms of our century, insuring the production of self-monitoring and self-disciplining  ‘docile bodies’ sensitive to any departure from social norms…” (Bordo, 186).  This ideology that in order to be attractive or desirable to men we have to look like the girl on TV has caused women of all ages to put an extensive amount of pressure on ourselves to try become this ideal women when in reality the standard we have today is unattainable. Truths about the type of pressure reveal in regards to trying to fit the “norm” inlcude that, “the average size of the idealized women has stabilized at 13-19% below healthy weight, and that the thin ideal is unachievable for most women and likely to lead to feelings of self-devaluation, depression and helplessness” (About-Face, 1).

The media is constantly enforcing that in order for women to be beautiful we must fit the mold that they have shaped for us, however over time as a culture we have began to try and stray from this norm that the media has tried to enforce. The 2016 cover of The Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Edition is just one of the steps our culture is taking.  After releasing the covers, the positive response was overpowering. Celebrities and previous Sports Illustrated Swimsuit models took to twitter to show their support and across the country people were applauding over Cover Model Ashley Graham because now, women of every shape and size are being represented. It is no longer a one size fits all game.

                          

(Various tweets in response to the 2016 SI Swimsuit Cover (Twitter))

           

This is a pivotal time for the women’s body image and the shift that will hopefully occur. The release of these covers will inform more people about the body image campaigns surrounding the female body type. Specifically Lane Bryant’s, “#ThisBody” campaign because their spokes model is the groundbreaking, Ashley Graham. #ThisBody campaign focuses on body positivity and inclusivity. The company is breaking stereotypes women face and Lane Bryant’s CEO Linda Heasley stated, “Today’s 'This Body' campaign cites the conversation as overdue, unavoidable, and a rapidly progressing cultural revolution, and allows Lane Bryant to continue to be a platform for shifting perception. This campaign continues a provocative manifesto to remind the world what we stand for...”(Black, 1).

                           

(#ThisBody Campaign (Refinery29.com))

The change we need to occur, is the high standard set for women’s bodies and the body shaming and poor body image that stems from that. This type of change is not something we will see over night, but with time I believe this change will happen. Sports Illustrated exemplifying that there is more than just one body type that can be on the cover of a swimsuit magazine and still be recognized as beautiful, is a step in the right direction. Moving forward, I hope more magazines and sources of media recognize the need for more body types to be displayed and the critical impact it can have on women and girls who struggle with body shaming and body image.

Bibliography

"Ronda Rousey, Ashley Graham & Hailey Clauson Each Score a SI Swimsuit 2016 Cover!" History in the Making:. N.p., n.d. Web. 07 Mar. 2016.

Bordo, Susan. Unbearable Weight: Feminism, Western Culture, and the Body. Berkeley: U of California, 1993. Print.

"Body Image | About-Face." AboutFace Body Image Comments. N.p., 11 Aug. 2011. Web. 07 Mar. 2016.

Black, Liz. "5 Plus-Size Models On Why They Love Their Bodies." Refinery29. N.p., n.d. Web. 07 Mar. 2016.

"Tyra Banks, Iskra Lawrence and More Twitter Reactions to Sports Illustrated's Groundbreaking Cover Stars." PEOPLE.com. N.p., 14 Feb. 2016. Web. 07 Mar. 2016.