Reference List
1. *Christine Williams. 1989. Masculinity in Nursing. (Chapter 4 in Gender Differences at Work, pp. 88-91; 109-130.)
2. Irene Padavic & Barbara Reskin. 2006. Gender Differences in Moving Up and Taking Charge. (In Adler & Adler, Sociological Odyssey, 2nd ed., pp. 281-290.)
3. Spencer Cahill. 1989. Fashioning Gender Identity.
4. Jhally, S., In Kilbourne, J., Rabinovitz, D., & Media Education Foundation. (2010). Killing Us Softly 4: Advertising's Image of Women.
5. Katharina Linder. 2004. “Images of Women in General Interest and Fashion Magazine Advertisements from 1955 to 2002.” Sex Roles 51:409-421.
6. Advertisements obtained from: elle.com, maxim.com (money and power section), muscleandfit.com (performance-training section),
Socialization and the Power of Advertising is an article written by Jean Kilbourne about the influence of advertising. In it, she focuses on the impact advertising has on people, especially young people, to buy. In her film, Killing Us Softly 4, Kilbourne changes gears and talks about advertising’s image of women. In both the article and the film, the message is the same: advertising seeps in to our environment and influences us, whether we realize it or not.
People have used women in print media to sell their products since the mid-19th century. The women in the ads were portrayed with thin waists, large breasts and stylish clothing. As the roaring 1920’s moved in, American women scored voting rights and birth control. Due to World War I, it became necessary for women to work. The print world began to portray women in a boyish, sexy fashion. Hemlines rose for sex appeal. Breasts were bound so women didn’t appear too feminine in the work-place. Hair was cut shorter for convenience and the flapper-girl was born.
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.
The documentary Killing Us Softly 4 discusses and examines the role of women in advertisements and the effects of the ads throughout history. The film begins by inspecting a variety of old ads. The speaker, Jean Kilbourne, then discusses and dissects each ad describing the messages of the advertisements and the subliminal meanings they evoke. The commercials from the past and now differ in some respects but they still suggest the same messages. These messages include but are not limited to the following: women are sexual objects, physical appearance is everything, and women are naturally inferior then men. Kilbourne discusses that because individuals are surrounded by media and advertisements everywhere they go, that these messages become real attitudes and mindsets in men and women. Women believe they must achieve a level of beauty similar to models they see in magazines and television commercials. On the other hand, men expect real women to have the same characteristics and look as beautiful as the women pictured in ads. However, even though women may diet and exercise, the reality...
In a brilliant update of the Killing Us Softly series, Jean Kilbourne explains the dangers of advertisements and how they objectify women. Advertisements intelligently portray women in a sexual and distorted way in order to attract the consumers’ attention. Media sets a standard on how young women view themselves and puts them at risk for developing an eating disorder. Kilbourne’s research has led her to educate those who have fallen victim to achieving the “ideal beauty” that has evolved in today’s society.
Jean Kilbourne’s “Two Way a Woman Can Get Hurt: Advertising and Violence” is a section of a book titled: “Deadly Persuasion: Why Women and Girls Must Fight the Addictive Power of Advertising” that was originally published in 1999. It is about the images of women that advertisements illustrate. The central claim or thesis of the document is that: “advertising helps to create a climate in which certain attitudes and values flourish and it plays a role in shaping people’s ideas” (paraphrase). The author wants people by all genders and young children to acknowledge a right attitude towards what is shown in the advertisements so that the standards of behavior will not be influenced. As a result, it enables the negative contribution from the advertisements to be limited or eliminated.
Merskin, D (2004) Reviving Lolita? : A Media Literacy Examination of Sexual Portrayals of Girls in Fashion Advertising. In American Behavioral Scientist, vol. 48: pp.119-129. London: Sage Publications.
“How men and women differ: Gender differences in communication styles, influence tactics, and leadership styles” is another article explaining gender differences in leadership. According to the article, women encounter different challenges in the workplace with the glass ceiling and wage gap being the most popular issues. Though, in the United States the male-female wage gap has decreased, the women still earn about 77% of the amount men get. In matters concerning education, women are earning the same degrees as men but they make the small number of working people as compared to men. For example, in 2010 women in United States made up 47.2% of the students taking law and 36.8% of MBAs received.
Historically our society drives men and women toward different socially acceptable behaviors and careers. Stereotypically men are the capable breadwinners that choose careers as: firemen, policemen, mailmen, garbagemen, milkmen, and the list continues. However, women are the warm caregivers that may choose one of three titles: teacher, nurse, or secretary. The above career pathways have been driven by societal norms, subsequently leaving women with marginal room for vertical mobility and limited leadership representation.
doi:10.1111/nuf.12008 Whittock, M., & Leonard, L. (2003a). Stepping outside the stereotypes. A pilot study of the motivations and experiences of males in the nursing profession.
4) Kilbourne, Jean. Killing Us Softly 3: Advertising’s Image of Women. Dir. Sut Jhally. DVD. Media Education Foundation, 2000.
Men are traditionally seen as being in the "supervisor" position in the home. They are the heads of the household, the breadwinners, and the women are behind the scenes, like the threads that hold everything together. The same can be said about the workplace. Men tend to hold administrative positions, while women usually have the positions that support the administrator. They are the secretaries and assistants that do the work for their male bosses and prepare things for them that later on only the administrator may receive credit for. " ‘Where,' asks the Englishman who is prominent in social welfare, 'are you're men? We see their names on the letter-heads of organizations, but when we go to international conferences, we meet almost entirely women.' 'Our men-oh, they are the chairmen of boards, they determine the financial policy of our agencies, but they leave the practice to women. They are too busy to go to conferences.'" (Mead 304).
An article by Christina N Baker, Images of Women’s Sexuality in Advertisements: A content Analysis of Black And White Oriented Women’s and Men’s Magazine emphasizes on how women’s are portrayed in media such as advertisements and Magazine. The author analyzes how media has a huge impact in our society today; as a result, it has an influence on race and gender role between men and women.
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: