Is Straight the new Queer?
–David Beckham and the dialectics of
celebrity
He is, surely, the only heterosexual male in the country who could get away with being photographed
half-naked and smothered in baby oil for GQ and still come over as an icon of masculinity.
(GQ, October 2002. Article on Beckham as GQ's Sportsman of the Year, p264)
Indeed.
Let us tear our thoughts away from the image of David basted in oil and consider the
extract as one of innumerable examples of the media fascination with Beckham.
Given his penetration in Europe, Asia, Latin America and Africa, we can take as self-
evident that Beckham is a quantifiably significant figure in contemporary global
popular culture. By any measure of celebrity and any taxonomy of fame (Turner
2004:15-23), Beckham qualifies as a striking example. He has inevitably appeared in
a number of recent academic publications as an exemplar of celebrity and sports
culture (Whannel 2002, Turner 2004, Cashmore and Parker 2003) and, more notably
in Cashmore’s book, as the focus of a social biography (2004).
In his book, Understanding Celebrity (2004), Turner provides a comprehensive
overview of the vast literature which has developed on issues of celebrity and fame,
painting a broad picture of concerns divided between the significance of the apparent
explosion in celebrity ‘culture’ and the focus on celebrities themselves.
Within the literature on the social significance of celebrity culture, we can discern
two key themes. First, celebrity culture is a manifestation of globalised commodity
consumerism in advanced capitalism and second, its social function as a system of
meanings and values which is supplanting traditional resources for self and social
identities in late modern culture, including structures such as class, gender/sexuality,
ethnicity and nationality. Whilst the authors mentioned above both draw on and
contribute to these arguments, their focus remains broad, citing Beckham as a key
manifestation of the complex interdependence between globalised sports and media
industries, and transformations in gender and consumption. For example, although
Cashmore’s book is solidly researched on the impact of media finance on football and
has a sound argument on the significance of consumerism, he is prone to
generalisations about the transformations in masculinity and celebrity culture which
he suggests are central to understanding Beckham’s significance.
Turner suggests that there needs to be more focused empirical work on the specific
construction of celebrity since ‘modern celebrity…is a product of media
representation: understanding it demands close attention to the representational
repertoires and patterns employed in this discursive regime’ (Turner 2004: 8). This is
how this short piece offers a contribution to the literature - drawing on a qualitative
analysis of articles on Beckham, my discussion focuses on the meanings of
Beckham’s celebrity and whether they can tell us something about the way the
culture of fame operates.
I have drawn selectively from my data, but a fuller discussion of both the data and
grounded theory methodology can be found in a previous article (Rahman 2004). Out
of the six categories of meaning established through the grounded theory procedures
used in the study, my contention is that masculinity is a core nexus in ‘cultural
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circuitry’ (Hall1990) - making the stories relevant, understandable, and often
controversial. Moreover, the accompanying photo spreads often create a tension with
the text, emphasising dissonant/controversial images which testifies to a dynamic of
respect/ridicule in the representations.
To be more precise, there is a construction of deference to Beckham’s professional
status and to the Beckham family as the premier celebrity unit in the UK. Deference
to and respect for their status is evident not only in those magazines which have paid
for the privilege of access, but also the more gossip orientated celebrity weeklies such
as Heat (18-24 May, p6-8): ‘those lucky enough to be asked to join David and
Victoria enjoyed one the most extravagant soirees in recent memory. The sheer scale
of the £350000 shindig was stunning, even by the standards of Celebville’s most
extravagant couple’.
Coupled with this respect is a sense of ridicule, often in discrete publications, but also
within the same magazine and even sometimes the same article. Ridicule undercuts
the celebrity credentials of extravagance and glamour with an implication of
tackiness and vulgarity, and this gentle undercurrent becomes stronger when linked to
Beckham’s fashion icon status:
‘We’ve supported David through the highlights and lowlights of his various haircuts: the
streaked curtains, the skinhead and his travis bickle style mohican. But this latest look is a
‘do too far =- more village idiot than international style icon…
(Heat 13-19th April, pp24-25)
This dynamic of respect/ridicule relies heavily on another dynamic; that of
queer/normative invocation and recuperation. It is not only his fashion icon status
being ridiculed here but also his status as a heterosexual masculine icon:
Marie Claire June 2002 cover of Beckham and, Inside p69-76
Interview follows with questions ‘People say you’re vain. Do you think so?’,
‘You can see why people might think you’re a bit of a big girl’s blouse, because you have
manicures, sunbeds and bleach your hair.’
‘You’re also one of the few footballers to become a gay icon’
His gender/sexuality is anchored in hetero-family/masculine status but is somewhat
dissonant in terms of vanity/grooming and gay icon status. ‘Queerying’ Beckham is
not just a technique of ridicule (how very old fashioned that would be!) but also a
deliberate destabilisation of ontological anchors which induces a sense of dissonance:
An example from Heat (20-26th July 2002) has the cover byline: ‘Phwoar! Another
new look for Becks.’ with a trail for a story on pages 18-20 which has a photograph
of Beckham with his nail varnish highlighted and the text:
David sported a new blonde barnet and a fitted black suit, and despite the controversy caused
by his pink nail varnish he still managed to look macho and absolutely beautiful
This demonstrates some feminisation of Beckham but is counterbalanced by the very
masculine anchor of ‘macho’. There is a recognition that the highlighted ambiguity
in gender coding is potentially disruptive or controversial and hence it is recuperated
– ‘he still managed to look macho’. GQ from June 2002 repeats the play on gender
and sexuality, with a cover photo of Beckham lying down, bare torso but in a suit and
hat, with one hand showing a ring and nail varnish, and the other in the waistband of
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his trousers. Inside, on pages 142-55, there follow seven full pages of photos and an
interview conducted by David Furnish, a family friend of the Beckhams but also
Elton John’s partner and so one of the most visible gay men in celebrity culture.
However, rather than any danger of queering by association, the presence of Furnish
seems only to enhance the mega-celebrity and hetero status, since he is careful to
sound all the right notes of family, football and fatherhood in his questions in the text.
Rather, it is the photospread which induces the queerness in this example, with four
of Beckham’s naked torso in baby oil, of which one is him in unbuttoned cut-off
denim shorts on a weights bench – very retro 1970s gay.
In his history of male sports celebrities, Whannel suggests that Beckham is an
exceptional figure, both because he is one of the few footballers in the UK to achieve
full celebrity status, but also because he transgresses the discipline and work ethic
associated with sporting bodies, indulging himself through conspicuous and
narcissistic consumption (2002: 212). Whannel notes Beckham’s emergence during
the development of a men’s style press in the UK, documented thoroughly in Nixon’s
study of men’s magazines, which provides an account of the historical moment from
1984-1990 which saw the emergence of ‘new man’ imagery. Drawing on Mort’s
(1988) contention that this is the first period which showed men being sexualised - a
representational strategy previously applied only to women – Nixon concurs with
Mort that this moment marks the beginning of men being addressed as a specific
gender. However, these images of Beckham push at the boundaries of ‘new man’
constructions and ‘respectable’ images of sporting bodies, suggesting that the
deliberate, indelicate and delicious sexualisation of Beckham’s body derives its
power from the ‘danger’ this presents to sporting masculinity as well as simply
heterosexual masculinity. Thus we need ‘family, fatherhood’ and ‘football’ to anchor
the ‘queer’ Beckham.
Given these and more recent images (Vanity Fair cover in July 2004, for example),
we might be tempted to agree with Cashmore and Parker (2003) and Whannel (2002)
that Beckham is indeed a ‘postmodern’ or ‘hybrid’ celebrity, appearing singularly
able to float free of context and to signify many different meanings to many different
groups. But the brief examples of the queer/normative dynamic presented here
suggest that this is too glib an answer, precisely because there seems to be an explicit
recognition of this dynamic: the editor of GQ says of Beckham that ‘he is in touch
with his feminine side, but he is so obviously heterosexual that he can afford to be’
(Hot Stars, 2-8 November 2002 pp36-39). The deliberate induction of dissonance
suggests a reflexivity about the constructedness of these representations; a knowing
indication that queerying Beckham’s masculinity is not the reality of Beckham, but
rather that the queerying is perhaps a hyper reality as Baudrillard might have it.
Beckham does not float ‘free’: dialectical signs are precisely mapped onto him. Dyer
argues that film stars could be read as signs for specific versions of individuality, but
crucially, that these signs reflect the dominant ideological constructions of class,
ethnicity and gender/sexuality. In one example, he demonstrates how the sexually
transgressive and potentially lesbian elements of Jane Fonda’s star persona are
recuperated through the emphasis on her nationality and ethnicity, her ‘all-
Americanness’ (1998: 81). Similarly, Beckham’s queerness is deliberately deployed
as a sign, to be neutralised by heterosexual signs, thus recuperating the ideological
dominance of a heteronormative culture.
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Beckham’s masculinity can be read as a ‘sign’, divorced from traditional referents
and re-marked into a queer sign, specifically to promote consumption through the
heady mix of respected status and apparently exciting transgression as a key aspect of
this status. But this is a simulation, not indicating any ‘real’ queering of either the
subject, or indeed of the assumed audience who have to make sense of the sign.
Rather, the potential to remark Beckham as ‘queer’ seems to indicate that whilst
heterosexual masculinity can be a sign, so perhaps too does queer itself become a
sign, similarly divorced from its traditional referents. The ‘reality’ is thus simulated
through pre-determined codes of representation, and one such code seems to be that
gender transgression is culturally significant. Dialectical signs are mapped onto a
reality/hyper reality dynamic, with queerness presented knowingly as the hyper real
– after all, the reality is that Beckham is ‘so obviously heterosexual…’
It is possible to argue that the dynamics at work in making these representations
effective can be understood as dialectical since there are opposing momentums at
work in the construction of celebrity and fame. The respect/ridicule dynamic
demonstrates that constructions of celebrity cannot be uncritically deferential. The
gentle and knowing ridicule is a collusion between the media (tors) and the audience:
an indication that this relationship is the true romance of celebrity culture rather than
that between fans and icons. And why should this be so? Precisely because the
media needs to continue to feed the desires of the audience but there is no guarantee
that the desire will continue when an icon’s star wanes – unless of course, watching
the decline is as much part of the romance as building the respect. Marshall argues
that celebrity legitimises the individuality central to the lock between consumer
capitalism and liberal democracy (1997) and the respect/ridicule dynamic exemplifies
this function. The necessary continuation of consumption produces a dialectical
dynamic, wherein both respect and ridicule exist to permit easy shifts in emphasis
whilst maintaining the attention on the celebrity, which promotes continued
consumption. Beckham’s own demonisation and rehabilitation in the wake of France
98 testifies convincingly to the necessity for continuity of producing items for
consumption, no matter what the spin. Furthermore, the recent scandals over alleged
infidelities has generated a production spike in the amount of images and words
produced, whilst this time, not directly attacking Beckham.
The queer constructions of Beckham amplify respect/ridicule along a specific
dimension, supplying a dialectic of its own. The modes of meaning surrounding
Beckham do indicate a shift in the possible effective constructions of masculinity,
with the incorporation of a feminised interest in fashion (hairstyles, nail varnish,
presentation in general) and the affirmation of gay icon/object of desire. It is in these
constructions of dissonance that the de-essentialising of masculinity occurs, which
may be the productive moment of disruption for those receiving the images and texts,
and incorporating them into their own meaning systems around Beckham, footballers,
masculinities, heteronormativity. The fact that these queer moments are possible may
be testament enough to Beckham’s social significance; he is in the right place at the
right time (with the right body and profession) to be our cultural lightning conductor
for contemporary anxieties around gender/sexuality.
However, the dialectic of queering Beckham has a synthesis which suggests that the
route into queerness is not as important as the route out. These are only fleeting
materialisations of the queer David Beckham – flashes of fleshy dissonance glimpsed
briefly before the recuperation into the heterosexual subject, coded by footie, family
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and fatherhood. The newer dissonant properties of masculinity are literally
contextualised within ideological codes of heterosexuality. The evident
theatricalisation and appropriation may appear to signal a productive route into
queerness – from heterosexual to queer (the pink nail varnish, the oiled fashion
shoots, the gay gym denim cut offs shot), but what if it is actually working in reverse?
What if the cultural effectivity is achieved by appropriating and theatricalising from
gay/transgender to heterosexual? – de-essentialising ‘queer’ for productive
dissonance and amusement, but safe in the knowledge that there is a secure and
policed route out of ‘queerness’ – the encoded red carpet of heterosexual masculinity.
The possibilities of a queer visibility are thus denied through the recuperative effects
of the dialectics at work. The ridiculing of his gender transgressions may be
necessarily gentle, in order to walk the tightrope of respect/ridicule, but they
nonetheless assume that transgressions are problematic. Furthermore, the
reality/hyper reality dynamic deploys queer as a ‘sign’ precisely in order to effect a
recuperation of a normative version of ‘reality’. It seems that the weight of a
predominantly heteronormative culture reinforces the dialectics in celebrity culture,
making the unproblematic visibility of queer subjects improbable. After all, in these
examples - focused one on the world’s premier celebrities - ‘queer’ itself is not
actually cool - it seems that only the simulation of queer is cool. Within
contemporary fame, perhaps straight is really the new queer?
References
Cashmore, E (2004) Beckham, (Oxford: Polity Press) 2nd Edition.
Cashmore, E and Parker, A (2003). ‘One David Beckham? Celebrity, Masculinity
and the Soccerati’ in Sociology of Sport Journal, vol. 20, no.3, pp214-231.
Dyer, R (1998) Stars, (London: BFI publishing) 2nd edition.
Hall, S (1990) ‘Encoding/Decoding’ reprinted in S. Hall (ed.) Culture,Media,
Language (London: Unwin Hyman) from original 1977 publication at Birmingham
Centre for Contemporary Cultural Studies.
Marshall, P.D. (1997), Celebrity and Power: Fame in Contemporary Culture.
(London: Unversity of Minneapolis Press).
Mort, F (1988) ‘Boy’s own? Masculinity, style and popular culture’, in J. Chapman
and J. Rutherford (eds), Male Order. Unwrapping Masculinity, London, Lawrence
and Wishart, pp193-224, 1988.
Nixon, S (1996) Hard Looks: Masculinities, Spectatorship and Contemporary
Consumption, (London: UCL Press).
Rahman, M (2004) ‘David Beckham as a Historical Moment in the Representation of
Masculinity’ in Labour History Review, vol. 69, no.2, pp219-234, August 2004.
Turner, G (2004) Understanding Celebrity, (London: Sage)
Whannel, G. (2002) Media Sport Stars: Masculinities and Moralities, (London:
Routledge).
