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).
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.
This is an important topic, good job! I think its so important to recognize that over the years magazines, particularly Sports Illustrated, have been using homogenizing images of women, and that these images do cause harm. The increase of body diversity in media is definitely an important issue and a step up for today.
ReplyDeleteI really enjoyed this topic and I think it is a good topic to address. I agree that these body images that are expressed through Sports Illustrated have an affect on many people, especially athletes. They are always portraying small, fit women and this is a negative impact for women because they feel that they have to look up to this standard that is portrayed. It doesn't matter what size someone is, and I really like how you stated that "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" I thought this was a powerful and very true quote. It doesn't matter if a women is not super thin or in shape, it doesn't take away from their beauty.
ReplyDeleteI think that the topic of women and body image in media is a very powerful topic. For many females of all ages, they often look in the media at models or actresses and feel that their bodies need to look like theirs. I think that Sports Illustrated made a daring but awesome move by using a plus sized model on the cover of their magazine because typically we see size 0 models in bathing suits on these covers. Sports Illustrated is showing that any girl no matter what their size is beautiful. I think the media needs to portray all types of women more often so that women are not focused on one type of female body image which is almost impossible to look like.
ReplyDeleteI really enjoyed reading this article! Currently there is a great push going on about body positivity and accepting your own body that is very positive and shows that we are moving in the right direction. My only issue is that Sport Illustrated swimsuit edition is still super degrading to women. Even though we're moving in the right direction with the body types that we see in the media, we still see sexualized women in the media way too much.
ReplyDelete