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ABSTRACT
In every era, the Hollywood sex symbol signifies, in addition to the obvious trait of sexuality, a complicated matrix of social ideals, fantasies and prejudices. Central to many of the ideological issues brought to bear through sex symbols are notions of ethnicity and nationality. Actress Gal Gadot, most famous for her role as the modern Wonder Woman, consolidates and embodies specific ideas about gender and sensuality in relation to class and nationhood. Gadot is a version of the ‘Continental Exotic’, an alluring and dangerously fetishistic woman who reinforces specifically American insecurities when faced with an uncontainable other. The Continental Exotic bridges the gap between Hollywood’s tradition of whiteness as a cultural ideal of female beauty and Otherness as the domain of exciting but treacherous sensuality.
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Jeffrey A. Brown
Jeffrey A. Brown is Professor and Chair in the Department of Popular Culture at Bowling Green State University. Brown earned his doctorate in Anthropology from the University of Toronto. He has published numerous works focused on gender, ethnicity and sexuality in contemporary media. He is also the author of eight books, including Black Superheroes: Milestone Comics and Their Fans (2000), The Modern Superhero in Film and Television (2016), and Batman and the Multiplicity of Identity: The Contemporary Comic Book Superhero as Cultural Nexus, (2019).