From celebrity endorsed product advertisements to Reality Television programs on cosmetic surgery, the commercialized nature of ‘Idol culture’ has become crucial in reforming beauty ideals and perceptions of masculinity and femininity amongst mainstream society in East Asia. Due to the drastic popularity of South Korean Idol groups both nationally and throughout East Asia including China, Japan and Taiwan women and men have been increasingly more exposed to sexualized imagery of ‘desirable’ bodies (Epstein and Joo 2012). This has generated an international idealism of the ‘Korean body’ as a national symbol representing South Korea’s participation in the global arena. Media liberalization during the 1990s increased the presence of Korean culture across Asia, especially China through CCTV network that aired Korean drama programs primarily due to cheaper programming costs (Shim 2011). As a result of the popularity gained by Korean music and movie stars, large companies started using ‘Idols’ to endorse their products. Idol endorsements are especially popular in the market saturated beauty and cosmetics industry, however this has essentially fueled a reformation of standardized beauty ideals (Schwekendiek, Yeo & Ulijaszek 2013). This basic marketing strategy used to encourage consumers aspirations of having the large eyes and smooth skin of their favourite Korean stars has created a cultural on-flow stimulating a growing cosmetic surgery market. No longer are ‘whitening’ products sufficient to satisfy the needs of a beauty driven society in declaring their economic status. Consumers now believe the coveted ‘V-shape’ face, double eyelids and straight nose are essential to success and are not shy of altering their appearance for a compet...
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MULTIMEDIA
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Cover Girl cosmetics have been the top-seller since 1961 and are still going strong. It is hard, with all the advanced lines of make-up for one product to go as far as Cover girl has, so how does Cover Girl cosmetics do it? A lot of Cover Girl’s strong, on going successes are due to changing the look of the product, exceptional promotions which the public can’t look over, giving a cosmetic appeal to both older and younger aged women and most importantly by using near perfect women and teens to model their products. Although it’s wonderful that Cover Girl has been and still is so successful, it has put a dentation in today’s society in what women’s appearance should and shouldn’t be. Women and young adolescence are confused of what their appearance should be. Cover Girl has many famous models; one inparticular is the famous country singer Faith Hill. Faith is tall, skinny, and flawless. When women see models like her doing the advertising for Cover Girl, they automatically feel that they should look the same. Later in this paper I will go into semiotics which derives from the Greek word semeion meaning sign, it basically describes how people interpret different signs, such as models, and how these signs might effect one’s life and self-esteem. Proctor & Gamble are the owners and starters of Cover Girl cosmetics. To keep up the success of Cover Girl they must keep on top of the advertising game to stay above the competitors. To do this they do many promotions, some include using famous singers, changing displays, giving away samples and one of the most important advertisement of all is the models Cover Girls incorporates in their ads. Cover Girls did one promotion with Target stores to promote their product. They used the famous group 98 Degrees to make a sweepstakes called, “Fall in Love with 98 Degrees Sweepstakes.” The grand prizewinner of this sweepstakes is an appearance in the new 98 Degrees music video. This advertising doesn’t just take place in the Target stores; it also takes place in Teen magazine, stickers on the new 98 Degrees CDs, a national radio campaign, and the national Teen People magazine. Because it’s teens that mainly listen to the music that 98 Degrees produces, it’s the teens that this particular promotion is focused on. I s...
For our project, K-POP, we have decided to compare how the digital realm influenced the boom of cosmetic surgery in Korea compared to American plastic surgery, where digital means are a less common tool utilized to increase, accentuate, and bring publicity to this industry. We want to take a deeper look into how Korean pop culture and its technology may be influencing the process one takes to get plastic surgery, such as the advertising it provides for each individual plastic surgery. This is opposite of America, where plastic surgery is more taboo, therefore absent in these spaces. Through this research we are ultimately focusing, emphasizing, and analyzing how the digital realm of each country has recently influenced the plastic surgery industry,
How should I look like to have the ideal body? An increasing number of women ask themselves this question many times in their lives. Deborah Sullivan’s essay, “Social Bodies: Tightening the Bonds of Beauty”, discloses the different cultural traditions that require various methods of body modifications. Women should undergo such modifications to obtain social acceptance. Similarly, “Pressures to Conform” by Celia Milne discusses the effects of media and society on women, and how women view their physical appearance. The media gives women a plethora of choices for the perfect body and even provides ways on how to achieve them. There is no escaping. There is no excuse of not getting the ideal body that ranges from that of a stick-thin ramp model’s to the buff and chiseled outline of a body builder’s. Still, the struggle doesn’t end here. Women also desire smooth, wrinkle-free skin, hairless faces, and ample busts. “Stencil” women are celebrities, models, actresses - women whose coveted looks are seen through discriminating TV screens, posters, and magazines. The steady demand for these forms of media is mainly due to women who are looking for body images to pattern from. These women are on the constant lookout in updating their appearance and considering the bulk of information that the media presents to them, the media is a source of considerable amount of physical and psychological stress. In their fight for their roles in society, women undergo various body modifications to suit the taste of the present-day culture.
Shaving, applying makeup, and curling hair are a few practices that if a female does not partake in, society, and the social norm are stunned. Those are just a few disciplinary body practices in today’s society. Disciplinary body practices “Are practices because they involve taken-for-granted routinized behaviors and they are disciplinary because they involve social control in the sense that we spend time, money, and effort, and imbue meaning in these practices that regulate our lives” (Shaw 193). These practices can extend way beyond the basic beauty routine of a female as well. Plastic surgery plays a huge role in these body practices. Even men have practices that they are expected to partake in. They are less extreme in terms of price and just simpler in general. But for example, men are expected to have shaved necks, large muscles, and a broad upper body. These standards are causing body and beauty shaming around the world. Disciplinary body practices relate to the adamant consumer culture, constant media advertisements, widespread globalization, persuasive colonialism, and powerful imperialism.
Body sculpting is a fast growing obsession and profession in many parts of today’s self-absorbed world, in which the importance of appearance is overly emphasized. Quickly obtaining muscle, mass, and ultimately reaching ones desired physique becomes hard to do when the standards for a perfectly sculpted body in todays society is becoming harder and harder to achieve. Advertisements using sex appeal rose from 15 to 27 percent in a 20 years period (Pappas). These advertisements constantly push images of photo shopped, unrealistically fit models, pressuring society to aim for unrealistic shapes and sizes. Paralleling the rise in sexy advertisements is the growth of sports products and nutritional supplement vending retail web sites.
As a result of the wide variety of media that is in the world, it plays as one of the main factors to most of the body distortion and low self-esteems that is put on men and women. According to Lau, beauty or body perfection, “...is a social/cultural construct, and that advertising, lifestyle/entertainment magazines, movies, scripted and reality television, documentaries and even public service campaigns all play a role in normalising the unrealistic pursuit of body perfection” (Lau, Harris-Moore…). Because of the broad variety of media there is, each has a different perspective on what the ideal ‘real beauty’ is, this causes a lot of pressure to be put upon people on how they should truly appear. In addition, media is also setting the standards that people should start looking like celebrities. As stated by a plastic surgeon, Z. Paul Lorenc in The Culture of Beauty, is that “...one of several concerns is the more and more Americans are seeking plastic surgery because of the very high beauty bar set by celebrities” (Gerdes, The Culture of Beauty). Due to the media constantly flaunting how attractive celebrities are, it makes men and women feel as if they are not good enough and that they need to modify themselves to become socially acceptable in the eye of
Both men and women feel the need to look ‘ideal’ in today’s society, however these pressures fall more on women than men, although a lot of men do feel the need to under go procedures as well, “ A quarter for the Harley Medical Groups liposuction customers are now male.” (Nicolas, 2007) However according to BAAPS , 90,5% of women have cosmetic surgery where as only 4,757 of men have a cosmetic procedure (BAAPS). “Men began to dress soberly, paying little attention to their physical appearance, while women were increasingly concerned with altering and beautifying their bodies” (Davies, 1995) This means that the female body is the centre of attention in today’s society highlighting how women are expected to look ‘flawless’, at all times due to cultural expectations as well as emphasizing ...
The central message of this work is that society is obsessed with appearances. The point the author is trying to make is beauty should not be the most important trait of a person. In today’s society everything is based on looks, people are more concerned about a person’s outward appearance. People strive to attain a certain ideal of beauty currently prevalent in their culture. A beauty ideal is an overall "look" incorporating both physical features (e.g., "pouty" lips vs. thin lips, large breasts vs. small), and a variety of products, services, and activities. These can include clothing, cosmetics, hairstyling, tanning salons, leisure activities (e.g., aerobics, tennis, or weightlifting), and even plastic surgery (e.g., breast or lip implants or liposuction). Ideals of beauty often are summed up in a sort of cultural short-hand; one may talk about a "vamp," a "girl-next-door," or an "ice queen," or one may refer to specific women who have come to embody an ideal, such as Cher, Marilyn Monroe, or Prin-cess Di. ”(Englis 2).
“If more Asian women were used in fashion and advertising, it would change people’s ideals,” said Grace Park, who was forced to undergo double eyelid surgery by her mother, because of her slanted, one-folded eyes. People of East Asian descent have been the most susceptible to the obsession over “Western” beauty as the “East Asian” face is rare in Western Media. Editor-in-chief of Jade Magazine, Ellen Hwang, says everything in the media consists of the “Eurasion” look, “big blue- eyed blondes.” “Here in the US, even more than in Asia, the models and movie stars you see and who girls want to emulate are Caucasian. Yes, there is Lucy Liu, but most models are Western. And young girls often want to look like those models.” Chinese American, Shin –Yu Wang, who was born with double eyelids and was thoug...
The models and celebrities in the media that set the standard for what women should look like are thinner than 90-95 percent of the American female population (Seid p.6). This is an unrealistic portrayal of what the human body should look like when compared to most women’s genetic makeup. Women’s self-image, their social and economic success, and even their survival can still be determined largely by their beauty (Seid p.5). Men on the other hand seem to have it a little easier when it comes to looks. Their self-image is largely determined by what they accomplish in life and not by whether or not they meet the social standard for looks. Modern clothing and fashion require women to show off their bodies more in tight clothes and by showing more skin than in the past. According to Roberta Seid ...
Approximately about a decade ago, Japanese, Chinese, Korean and Vietnamese women all had a distinctive look and features. Single eyelid, thin lips, short-bridged nose and oval shape face are few of the features that distinguish Asian women apart. However, these distinctive features are slowly fading away as the new westernized features are coming in. Through the mass media and their
Most viewers of commercial television or consumers of popular magazines have seen striking images of women whose appearance has been dramatically altered. Many of these “made-over” women changed their body image through diet and exercise regimes, skillfully applied makeup, or elective cosmetic surgery. Possessed of higher education, prestigious careers, and families, these successful women often report that they felt some aspect of their appearance prevented them from reaching their goals. Responding to criticism from feminists, they defend the choice to enhance their appearance as a tactical effort to win power in normative society. Drawing on popular media interpretations of third wave feminism, women compelled to politicize a personal decision to “improve” their image have wrapped this act in ideological jargon.
There are so many forms of propaganda that surround our lives on a every day basis, and these negative messages persuade and shape our thoughts of perfection, of who we are, and who we ought to be. The beauty industry and its’ advertisements is one type of propaganda that ultimately characterizes the way we think of ourselves. The media is relentless in reminding us every chance they get why women need to be perfect and what we need to achieve that. There is endless pressure as women to have a perfect body and appearance. The beauty industry’s aim through advertisement is to make women feel as if we need to buy the beauty products in order to look and feel like the models on television, magazines, and in commercials. The beauty industry is very successful because as women, we often feel compelled to buy whatever is necessary to look “perfect.” In years past the beauty industry has been solely focused on the obvious beauty tools such as makeup, hair accessories, lotion, etc. However, we have become more intrigued by even more aspects of the beauty world such as undergarments and everywhere in between. In other words, media propaganda is more interested in the “selling of sex” now than ever before. An unfortunate yet accurate depiction by actress Helen Mirren reads, “Flesh sells. People don’t want to see pictures of churches, they want to see naked bodies.” Just as Mirren knows this to be true, so does the beauty industry and they have taken it and ran with it.
Show business promotes commercials, print advertisements, films and shows where unbelievably perfect women are seen as the ‘ideal beauty’ The ‘ideal beauty’ controls the behavior of young girls and manipulates their perception of beauty. The term ‘ideal beauty’ is defined to be a conception of something that is perfect, especially that which one seeks to attain. Many young girls everyday are exposed to fashion and beauty advertisements that feature models who are portrayed as ‘perfect’. Due to this Technological Age, girls are exposed to many advertisements that encourage them to be like the featured models- tall, skinny, and foreign. There is also a survey conducted by Renee Hobbs, EdD, associate professor of communications at Temple University which states that, “The average teenage girl gets about 180 minutes of media exposure daily and only about ten minutes of parental interaction a day.” Moreover, media also promotes and advertises cosmetics, apparel, diet pills and exercise gears in the name of beauty and fitness, convincing girls to buy and ultimately patronize their products. Becoming very addicted with using such products can eventually lead to overdoes and becoming vainer. It may seem obvious to most of us that people prefer to look at beautiful faces. While beauty itself may be only skin deep, studies show our perception of beauty may be hard-wired in our brains (Stossel,