ing” of the working women of the decade. Women
on both shows wore tailored business suits made
with broad, padded shoulders; loud but tasteful jew-
elry; and hairstyles that required much hair spray
to remain in place. Women wore suits to assert their
new feminine masculinity—or masculine femininity.
By blending gender traits, proponents of the new
style argued, an androgynous person would embody
the best of both genders and express even a “third”
gender. However, the key gender remained the mas-
culine one, a fact that did not slip by critics of an-
drogyny. Many called not for embracing androgyny
but for thinking up and then embodying new sorts
of gender expression that resisted a choice between
“masculine” and “feminine” entirely.
Popular Culture Androgyny in the 1980’s—in addi-
tion to being embraced by the fashion world, women
in the workplace, and many feminists—was repre-
sented most profoundly in popular culture. The
gender-bending singers and musicians of “glam” or
“glitter” rock, whose popularity peaked in the early
1970’s with such performers as Lou Reed, Alice Coo-
per, Suzi Quatro, Freddie Mercury, and David Bowie,
inspired the androgynous fashions of the late 1970’s
and early 1980’s. Gender-bending was incorporated
by rockers Kiss and early punk and alternative rock-
ers, including Iggy Pop, the Cure, and Siouxsie and
the Banshees. The 1980’s saw androgyny epitomized
by singers such as Boy George, Adam Ant, Prince,
Michael Jackson, Annie Lennox, and Grace Jones
(who also helped popularize power dressing and
short hairstyles).
Following in the footsteps of the early 1980’s
gender-bending pop singers were heavy metal bands,
including Bon Jovi, Poison, Mötley Crüe, and Twisted
Sister, whose members wore tight spandex pants and
heavy makeup and had “big” hair, contributing to a
highly stylized rock aesthetic that seemed contrary to
the genre’s masculine antics and lyrics. This heavy
metal aesthetic was not unlike the glam rock of the
1970’s, and its androgynous leanings were often criti-
cized as too feminine. Indeed, groups such as Bon
Jovi would be categorized in a genre called “hair
metal” because of their prettified hair.
Country-folk singer k. d. lang, who arrived on the
music scene with her first successful album in 1987,
was unapologetically androgynous, even as she faced
a country music market of mostly socially conserva-
tive consumers. Within a few years, she came out as
lesbian. Folk singer Sinéad O’Connor was shock-
ingly—for the time—bald, and she wore what many
considered “formless,” less-than-feminine clothing.
In the world of fashion, many supermodels de-
fined the androgynous look by moving away from a
more curvaceous body style to a more boyish one.
The top designers created a look that was already
popular among singers of the time. Because models
were becoming celebrities in their own right, what
they wore quickly became fashionable. This gender-
bending caught on in the worlds of fashion and art
photography as well and manifested most popularly
in advertising—which reached consumers hungry
for a new look.
Impact By the end of the 1980’s, gender-bending
would see a surge in popularity among youth who
embraced androgyny as a political identity and be-
gan naming themselves “genderqueer” instead of
“androgynous.” Among college and university stu-
dents, gender roles and sexuality became more fluid,
and one could argue that the mainstream popularity
of androgyny in the 1980’s led to the beginning of a
breakdown of personal barriers, allowing some to
embrace alternative gender expressions. Androgyny
remained a fashion statement as well for a time, al-
though it later subsided. The rise of hip-hop helped
eclipse androgynous styles in popular music, and
music videos of later decades tended to express
a more culturally acceptable hyperfemininity and
hypermasculinity.
Further Reading
Bullough, Bonnie, Vern L. Bullough, and James
Elias, eds.Gender Blending. Amherst, N.Y.: Prome-
theus Books, 1997. Covers androgyny in its mul-
tiple forms, including gender-bending, trans-
gender, transsexuality, and cross-dressing. The
editors are well-known researchers in the study of
sexuality and gender.
Celant, Germano, and Harold Koda, eds.Giorgio
Armani. New York: Guggenheim Museum, 2000.
Overview of the designs of Giorgio Armani, with
discussion of the play of androgyny and gender in
his clothing styles of the 1980’s.
Heilbrun, Carolyn G.Toward a Recognition of An-
drogyny. 1973. New ed. Bridgewater, N.J.: Replica
Books, 1997. Heilbrun surveys the literature from
classical times to the late twentieth century to find
literary and mythical references to androgyny.
Rubinstein, Ruth P.Dress Codes: Meanings and Mes-The Eighties in America Androgyny 57