Sexist paradox in the names of female perfumes: A critical stylistic analysis of selected products

Abstract

Naming of cosmetic products is vital to continuous customer patronage. Therefore marketers have adopted various stylistic devices which include clipping, nominalization, ellipsis, abbreviations etc in naming their products since they are limited by space provided for labelling. This study, however,  attempted to reveal an ideological paradox by using critical stylistic devices to show how women have been stereotyped, objectified and at the same time assigned power roles which contradict sexism. Previous related studies have examined sexist portrayals of women in names of perfumes and found that women were only represented as sex objects and victims ignoring other possibilities. This study has not only debunked such sexist roles but  also showed how these names of perfumes have assigned power to women presenting us with a case of a sexist paradox. The study adopted Jeffries' critical stylistic framework as its core theoretical grid. A total of 134 female perfume names were collated from an online shopping mall to serve as data for the qualitative analysis carried out.  The study found out that some names of female perfumes align with the ideology that ‘sex sells’ in advertising. It also established the idea that perfume names assign power to women depicting them as the stronger sex. This study concluded that women are meant to own their sexuality as reflected in the nominalization perfume names which convey positive ideology.