The Role of Female Characters and Female Bodies in Pop Culture “Viking” Media

After reading Njal’s Saga, we get a clearer, more diversified picture of what female characters can, should, and will do in their lives. Based on Ibn Fadlan’s account alone, we would get an extremely limited and unrepresentative portrait of women in Viking cultures. When characters like Hallgerd and Bergthora are added to this tableau, however, we begin to see that while their environments are distinctly male-dominated and patriarchal, women still have opportunities to exercise power and influence events in major ways. This does not seem to have translated into pop culture, and the entertainment industry takes advantage of female characters for the benefit of a primarily male audience.

            If you were to ask someone at random today what their most recent or memorable encounter with Viking culture in the media was, they would probably point towards TV shows such as Vikings or The Last Kingdom, or perhaps even video games like God of War, For Honor, or The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim. I personally only have experience with the first and last of these examples, so this is where this blog will be focused.

            First, let’s talk about armor. Specifically, let’s talk about the difference between “male armor” and “female armor” in media. Here, I’ll be using pictures from Skyrim to illustrate what it is I’m talking about, and I’m sure most if not all of you already know what I’m going to point out.

            The point of armor is to keep you protected from various forms of danger, like someone wanting to take care of your backache with an axe, or a formerly-blind man trying to chop your head off, just to name a few… This makes perfect sense, unless of course you’re designing armor for your video game or tv show characters. In these cases, it obviously (sarcasm) makes sense to make armor for female-bodied characters more… non-existent, because the most important thing about these characters is obviously the fact that they are female-bodied (sarcasm) and we need to remind consumers of this media of that fact by having them walk around in metal bikinis in frigid temperatures. This is totally what any sane person would do in a real situation (S A R C A S M). This approach goes in complete opposition to characters like the Valkyrie Brynhild/Sigrdrifa, who are portrayed as fully-armored, sword-in-hand, and ready to kick your butt straight to Valhalla.

Sure, this gendering of armor doesn’t always happen, but it happens often enough for us to notice a pattern and for things like “bikini armor” to become a defining aspect of the video game world. Additionally, you may want to point out that in a lot of pop culture material, Viking armor shows a lot of skin regardless of the sex of the person wearing it. Yes, it is true that shirtless berserkers and longaxe-wielding barbarians with exposed arms and legs. However, think about how this exposed skin is often used and sexualized. For males, the exposed skin accentuates their muscular bodies. For females, the exposure is done primarily to show off body parts that are often sexualized (cleavage, thighs, lower back, etc…). So it’s not just about the exposed skin and subsequent uselessness of their “armor,” but also about the purpose of exposing said skin.

Let’s shift gears and talk about the roles and personalities of female characters in a TV show like Vikings, and compare them to some female characters from Njal’s Saga. Vikings is known for having some “strong female characters,” and characters like Lagertha or Astrid certainly challenge the housewife/damsel in distress archetype by participating in “masculine” activities such as warfare and leadership. However, this comes at a cost. First, it implies that women’s only avenue to power or respect (from other men) is by becoming more like men. Yes, it challenges gender role archetypes, but it doesn’t actually challenge gender norms. While we don’t see as many physically strong female characters in the saga, we do see women subvert the plans and expectations of the men around them. Hallgerd, for example, is not described to be physically dominant; however, she is responsible for the deaths of countless people, including several husbands and a foster-father. She is able to work within the patriarchal system to exert power over others, especially men. Characters like Hallgerd and Bergthora are able to challenge the notion that women should be subservient, meek, and deferent towards men, not by being men, but by using the system itself to their advantage.

Lastly, I want to talk about sexuality and female characters in media. Focusing on Vikings, I have noted that most if not all female characters in the show are sexualized for the benefit of a heterosexual male viewer. If the women are not having sex with a man in the show, they have some sort of lesbian relationship. While portraying LGBT characters is admirable, it should be noted that we rarely (never in Vikings) see anything other than heterosexual or lesbian relationships, and the lesbian relationships we do see are fetishized or sexualized to please heterosexual men.