Female Representation in Hotel Advertisements within the Framework of Laura Mulvey’s Male Gaze Theory

This study examines how the representation of women in luxury hotel advertisements is constructed within the framework of Laura Mulvey’s male gaze theory. Advertisements, as products of visual culture, are approached not merely as aesthetic choices but as ideological texts that reproduce gender relations and regimes of looking. The sample of the study consists of advertising films belonging to a luxury hotel. Adopting a qualitative research approach, the study employs a theory-driven visual analysis method, analyzing indicators such as camera angles, modes of bodily representation, directions of gaze, passive/active role distribution, and the relationship between space and the body. The findings reveal that the female body is frequently positioned in advertisements as an object that is looked at, displayed, and offered as visual pleasure, while narrative power is constructed around the male subject. The study demonstrates that the male gaze theory developed by Laura Mulvey for cinema also possesses strong explanatory potential in non-cinematic visual fields such as tourism and advertising, thereby offering a critical contribution to feminist media studies and advertising literature.