"Paradises, wars and ufos": critical analysis of dominant discourses about love, sex and gender in the spanish version of four popular magazines

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to carry out a critical analysis of the dominant discourses about love, sex and gender stereotypes, by studying the lexical choices (metaphors and semantic fields) in four popular magazines recently published in Spain. Firstly, I will analyze the gender division of love & sex “works” (seduction, for men, and customer loyalty, for women). Secondly, I will examine the way in which these two phenomena are the object of some normative ideology, in relation to the idea of esoteric science; thirdly, I will take into consideration the three predominant metaphors (love and sex live paradise, war and object) and their relation with the leading models of women and men. Lastly, I will offer my conclusion on what I will call “instrumental romanticism”.