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Portrayals of women in media
Gendered advertising essay
Female stereotypes in media
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In order for two things in this world to be entirely equal, the two things would have to be the same. It should be inescapable; however, that men and women are not the same. The two have many physical and psychological differences that set them apart. Many would even go as far as calling them opposites. Are they really all that different though? Are we born with these traits that set us apart from the opposite sex, or are we overly influenced by society to think that each gender is supposed to act in a certain way? Like anything, there is a happy medium. A common place where we tend to see the dramatic differences between men and women are in advertising. Advertising bolsters the stereotypes of men and women and plays a very impressive role in gender beliefs in society (Paek 2011). Gender is represented in advertising today by the current popular culture that shapes the ideals and images we place on specific genders.
It is undeniable that men and women are portrayed differently in advertising and part of the reason is due to the objectification of women. The “women’s movement” has played a very big role in the significant social developments in the second half of the twenty first century (Artz 1991). This was a time when women saw themselves as being objectified and wanted to do something about it. They started questioning the rights of women and strived to be considered equal to the opposite sex in the eyes of the world (Sun 2010). This social and psychological movement, which began in the 1960’s, was a vital stepping stone for women as 1975 was even named “International Women’s Year” (Artz 1991). By the women’s movement assimilating more women into the workforce it greatly changed the way women were portrayed in advertisements ...
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...‘A meta-analysis of gender roles in advertising’, Academy of Marketing Science Journal, Vol. 38, no.4: 418-440.
Gould, S. (1987). ‘Gender differences in advertising response and self-consciousness variables’, Sex Roles, Vol. 16, no.5-6: 215-225.
Paek, H. (2011). ‘Examination of Gender-role Portrayals in Television Advertising across Seven Countries’, Sex Roles, Vol. 64, no.3-4: 192-207.
Peirce, K. (2001). ‘What If the Energizer Bunny Were Female? Importance of Gender in Perceptions of Advertising Spokes-Character Effectiveness’, Sex Roles, Vol. 45, no. 11-12: 845-858.
Sun, Y. (2010). ‘Do males and females think in the same way? An empirical investigation on the gender differences in Web advertising evaluation’, Computers in Human Behavior, Vol. 26, no. 6: 1614–1624.
Vinacke, W. E. (1957). Stereotypes as social concepts. Journal of Social Psychology, 46, 229–243.
The gendered patterns in advertising that Craig outlines in his essay still exist today, in commercials of how men and women are portrayed. In Steve Craig’s, “Men’s Men and Women’s Women,” it is stated that large advertisers and their agencies have evolved the pseudo-scientific method of time purchasing based on demographics, with the age and gender of the consumer generally considered to be the most important predictors of purchasing behavior. Therefore, Craig argues that computers make it easy to match market research on product buying patterns with audience research on television viewing habits, eventually building a demographic profile of the “target audience.” According to an article titled Web Advertising: Gender Differences in Beliefs, Attitudes and Behavior, previous research suggests males and females exhibit different beliefs about and attitudes toward traditional media advertising along with different advertising-suppressed consumer behaviors. Craig talks about how in John Fiske’s book, Television Culture (1987, Chs.
Overall, his claim that males respond best to simple, seemingly straight-forward advertisements was well thought out and supported through sufficient evidence. Gladwell successfully provided the proper amount of evidence supporting his claim and had he showed opposing views or views of the consumer it only would have added to an already successful paper. This essay is a perfect example of the importance of a thorough introduction to provide the reader with a concise synopsis of what the paper intends to covers. Had Gladwell excelled in both areas he neglected, this would be an extremely interesting, thought-provoking look into the world of advertising.
Rajecki, D. W., Dame, J., Creek, K., Barrickman, P. J., Reid, C. A., & Appleby, D. C. (1993). Gender Casting in Television Toy Advertisements: Distributions, Message Content Analysis, and Evaluations. Journal Of Consumer Psychology (Lawrence Erlbaum Associates), 2(3), 307.
Stephenson, T., Stover, W. J., & Villamor, M. (1997). Sell Me Some Prestige! The Portrayol of Women in Business-Related Ads. Journal of Popular Culture, 255-271.
Advertising, whether criticized or celebrated, is undeniably a strong force in American society. Portrayals and Images of women have long been used to sell in published advertisements. However, how they have been used has changed enormously throughout the decades. Women have fought to find a lasting and prominent position in their society. Only in the span of twenty years, between 1900’s and 1920’s, the roles of women changed dramatically here in United States.
Our society is a complex collection of institutions, status, roles, values, and norms, and the best way to understand and learn about them is through the use of cultural artifacts. These can be anything from music to art to literature, or as in the example of this discussion, the modern day creation of advertisement as seen in women's magazines. As Homo Sapiens moved from the hunter - gatherer way of life to industrial society , it was necessary to construct a framework for living so that such a concentrated number of people could exist together. This framework as come to consist of a myriad of expectations based on values and norms in the form of roles status and institutions. Desirable behavior is sought by people throughout the country based on how one is brought up and the expectations one is bombarded with on a daily basis. These expectations are reflected in every part of our culture and are used by people so as to know how to act in any given situation. The main examples are: the family, education, health and medicine, religion, and the law. I have found that certain mediums reflect the expected roles in these institutions better than others. I originally focused on gender roles as a depiction of stereotypical behavior as reflected by advertising especially the portrayal of women, but I discovered that there were other stereotypes being perpetuated as well that were just as institutionalized if not just simply less noticed or studied. Therefore, although this argument will focus on the depiction of females and the female role in advertising. It will also mention the general use of American values , norms, and institutions to influence consumers.
“Women in advertisements are getting younger, thinner, and more racially diverse.” Marketing to Women. June 2002. EMP Communications, 2002
Common sense seems to dictate that commercials just advertise products. But in reality, advertising is a multi-headed beast that targets specific genders, races, ages, etc. In “Men’s Men & Women’s Women”, author Steve Craig focuses on one head of the beast: gender. Craig suggests that, “Advertisers . . . portray different images to men and women in order to exploit the different deep seated motivations and anxieties connected to gender identity.” In other words, advertisers manipulate consumers’ fantasies to sell their product. In this essay, I will be analyzing four different commercials that focuses on appealing to specific genders.
To conduct the research, YouTube was utilized to find The Home Depot video advertisements. Videos were analyzed that demonstrated typical gender scripts as well as neutral ones. Notes were also taken for each of the videos for later reference. Each of the videos was discussed among the group members to come to conclusions. Some hypotheses were made such as the belief that men were thought to have been more likely to be targeted with stereotypical items for men, such as grills and construction supplies, while women would be steered towards kitchen and cleaning goods.
Johnson, F. (2002). Gendered voices in children's television advertising. Critical Studies in Media Communication, 19 (4), 461-481.
Advertising surrounds the world every second of the day. This form of influence has had the power to influence how society views gender roles ever since men and women began to appear in advertisements. Through the exposure to many different gender portrayals in advertising, gender roles become developed by society. This stems from how men and women are depicted, which forms stereotypes regarding the individual roles of men and women. People often shift their definition of an ideal image towards what they see in advertisements. From this, they tend to make comparisons between themselves and the advertisement models. Advertisements tend to be brief, but impactful. The different portrayals of men and women in advertising show that advertisements
The objectification of women is a huge issue in society and is often led by advertising. However, many men still believe that the adverts depicting women in a sexual and often passive posture are not very offensive, but rather very funny or sexy. However, how would they feel if it were their daughter or sister being advertised throughout the world as a sexual object? The Tiger Beer advertisement shown in the appendix is a clear example of the objectification of women in advertising. The Tiger Beer advert was made to appeal to men from the age of 20 to 60.
One of the most significant ideas that came to my attention is the way the image of a woman is demonstrated in advertisements. Sometimes society is to blame for. There is a relationship between law and society. There are many differences with the legal system in the aspects of race, class, gender, values, and morals. Is this to say that women are held responsible for nudity in advertisements rather are women enjoying the sexuality in advertisements? It is complex to understand human society and culture however, women have always been discriminated. In this case, it is important to understand why women are the main instrument in advertisements. The structure of society plays a role in the display of a women’s body. The World Health Organization reported that the sexualization of women and girls is related to societal problems. These issues should be address to improve the physical and emotional welfare of women. According to Kilbourne, body positions, facial expressions, and sexual power relationship generate from violent pornography. Advertisements portray women of having less power than men. Studies have concluded the differences of power between a man and a woman. Women are degraded in Advertisements. Society is to be mention because of history. Not only are women portrayed as sex objects they are constantly seen as homemaker experts. Dominick and Rauch examined 1,000 commercials on television and found that women are often shown as housewives. Gender has shown to be a major influence of discrimination. Women have always lacked opportunities compared to men. The majority of advertisements do not depict men in any sexual form. Women were always imposed to be wives and stay home with children. While men work and bring income....
The average American is exposed to hundreds of advertisements per day. Advertisements targeted toward females have an enormous effect on women's thoughts, attitudes, perceptions, and actions. Most of the time, women don't even realize these advertisements are formulating self-image issues. These ideals surround them daily and they become naturalized to the ads. Advertising creates an entire worldview persuading women to emulate the images they see all around them. In order to create a market for their products, companies constantly prey upon women's self esteem, to feel like they aren't good enough just the way they are. This makes women constantly feel stressed out about their appearance (Moore). Advertising has a negative effect on women's body image, health, and self-esteem.
Curry and Clarke’s article believe in a strategy called “visual literacy” which develops women and men’s roles in advertisements (1983: 365). Advertisements are considered a part of mass media and communications, which influence an audience and impact society as a whole. Audiences quickly begin to rely on messages sent through advertisements and can create ideologies of women and men. These messages not only are extremely persuasive, but they additionally are effective in product consumption in the media (Curry and Clarke 1983: