2025/12/31 by Lotte Verheijen, Sebastian Cordoba · 1 voice
Social Sciences · #Gender Roles and Identity Studies #Gender, Feminism, and Media #Media, Gender, and Advertising
paper · pdf · doi:10.21827/cadaad.17.2.42636
openalex publication_date 2025/12/31 · openalex created_date 2026/03/03 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/23
This study explores how female masculinities, specifically tomboy identity, are represented and commodified within The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills (RHOBH). Drawing on Communication Theory of Identity (CTI) and Multimodal Critical Discourse Analysis (MCDA), we examine how tomboy self-identification is constructed through language, visuals, and genre-specific conventions in reality television. Although RHOBH is grounded in hyper-feminine aesthetics and neoliberal values, several cast members refer to themselves as tomboys in confessionals, childhood retrospectives, or while performing masculine-coded activities. These expressions of tomboyism are typically brief, self-declared, and context-dependent, reflecting personal and enacted layers of identity while bypassing relational or communal affirmation. Our findings suggest that tomboy identity functions as a protective and performative strategy used to portray relatability, critique femininity, and reinforce authenticity without disrupting the show’s hyper-feminine norms. Through analysis of temporal-spatial identity constructs and visual semiotics (e.g., canons of use, instantiation, eyeline vector), we show how tomboyism is commodified to maintain viewer appeal while reinforcing heteronormative and consumerist ideals. Ultimately, tomboy discourse in RHOBH allows cast members to symbolically challenge gender norms while materially upholding them, revealing the complex ways reality television negotiates gender, identity, and power through mediated performance.