The two images on the right that I found are very degrading to women. In the image in the middle, the advertisement is insinuating that all women are good for is sex. Also, it is sending out a negative message to women that if you have large breasts then people will look past your flaws. This makes women who do not have large breasts feel like they are not good enough or less of a woman. It makes women seem more like objects than a human being.

The image on the bottom is sexually degrading to women. Majority of people who see this advertisement, even pre-teens, know what this ad is trying to imitate oral sex. Again, this ad is making women seem more like sexual objects rather than people. It is also putting down women by making it look like the woman is about to perform oral sex on a sandwhich to apparently target male customers. This reinforces the idea that all women are good for is sex.

In almost all of the ads I found, including the two above, were white women. Even the ones from websites discussing negative advertisement of women were mainly caucasian women. This shows that other ethnicities do take a backseat when it comes to body dissatisfaction issues in the mainstream. Also, both women are obviously skinny and are made to look very sexually desirebale. This makes women connect being desirable only with skinny models and contributes to women having a negative self perception.

The image that I found on the top I believe is an advertisement that is working against dominant messages about normative gender and sexuality. There is barely any make-up on the woman's face and there is nothing sexually suggestive about this photo. "Beauty rooted in enviromentalism" is written at the top which is promoting beauty in the form of a quality in a woman not on their physical appearance.

If I were to make an advertisement to empower both men and women I would make sure that nothing sexual was implied. I would also try to keep a picture of either a man or woman out of the advertisement so there would be more focus on the product itself. However, if I did include a picture of a person I would make sure that majority of the focus in the ad was on the product rather than the person or people in it.

Beauty in Todays Society

Both of these advertisements are clearly depicting women in a light that is against everything we have been working for. In the first advertisement for Dole & Gabanna, the woman is clearly the target or prize. Surrounded by a group of men, the woman is alone and on the ground. The men are perched over her ready to pounce. Above all she is very slim and “beautiful”.

In the second advertisement, Kim Kardashian is posing for the Complex magazine cover. She is in a scandalous outfit in a womanly pose. In the first picture she is untouched. She has darker skin, heavier, and herself. The second picture is the one that made the magazine cover. She has lighter skin and is slimmer. They made her picture into what society reacts to as “beautiful” as someone people idolize.

In each of these advertisements, people see the pictures and automatically admire them. Consumers will see the pictures and automatically relate the product with something they need to look this way. This all goes back to beauty myths in today’s society; these include skinny, fair skinned, and vulnerable. The males are dominant and the women please the physical aspect.

Beauty in today’s society is constantly backed up by the advertisements, models, and peers in magazines and TV. We hear that beautiful means being skinny, pale, and living up to a man's expectation. Without it, you will never get a husband, boyfriend, or be successful in the real world. Wrong. Dove came out with an advertisement a few years ago about loving your body. This is the first step towards a healthy society. These women are strong, beautiful, independent, and are proud of it. All women should follow their lead, embrace their body, and be healthy. In my advertisement I would feature real men and women who did not have to alter their bodies to reach their goals.

Women in Advertisements

It was not hard at all for me to find two advertisements that were exactly like the ones we discussed in class today. It wasn’t even necessary to scroll from page to page because I could have literally picked the first two and all I typed in the search engine was “women in advertisements.” However, it was interesting to me to see all the different types of pictures so, I looked through them until I found two that really made the ideas of dominance, sex and gender norms stand out most to me.

The first ad that stood out to me was an advertisement about voting. The first most obvious way that this add is degrading to women is the connection of the word choice on the advertisement “Voting is sexy” with the picture of toned, women’s legs in black, stiletto pumps. Clearly, the ad is using sex appeal to attract people to the idea of voting. They are demeaning a thing as important as voting by showing a stereotype of women who may choose to vote. This ad may invoke thoughts among women such as “If I don’t look like that, should I not vote?” Thoughts like these were demonstrated throughout all four readings; what we constantly see as beautiful is how we begin to actually think. Also, like we discussed in class, as if it’s not bad enough that they are making women into objects, it’s even worse that they are focusing on one part of that object which is exactly what they do in this ad; they focus in on the legs of a woman. Lastly, if we consider woman and voting in the past, we remember how long and hard feminists had to fight in order to earn women the right to vote. It is almost a slap in the face that they are now using the sexiness of women to draw appeal to voting when in the history, women were not even allowed near a voting poll.

In my second advertisement for Dolce and Gabbana, a woman is laid on her back and surrounded by three men. A fourth man is on top of her and is holding her down by her wrists as her legs are straddled around him. All of the men are above the woman; the three men standing up are literally looking down on her and she is lying on the ground making eye contact with none of the men. The background consists of a blue sky with clouds; it is a subtle way of sayi

ng “it’s a beautiful day and everything is okay.” This ad is supposed to be promoting a top of the line designer but instead all I can see is male dominance over a female and the idea of sex is being promoted more than the designer. The feeling that the ad gave off to me was very uncomfortable, not just because of this one ad, but because it made me realize how many ads are like this. Every time I flip through a magazine and ignore the messages that these ads are creating, the more I am conforming to these inaccurate views of our society.

This advertisement was very refreshing to see after looking through the pages and pages of degrading ads prior to this. It did not come easily to me, however. This ad took much more time because as I looked at all the ads that google pulled up, I realized that most ads are like the previous ones. This ad is for Microsoft Office and it has a normal looking mother pictured. It says that she is a “mother on a mission.” This ad portrays this woman as a successful, confident and goal driven woman who won’t stop until she has the tools she needs to complete whatever her mission may be. It does not give any insinuations as to what her “mission” is. It gives no indications that her “mission” has anything to do with being a female. If I made an advertisement, I would simply advertise what the product was and what it is going to do. That is all an ad should be anyway, something that is equally useful and directed at all people, no matter what their race or gender.

Week 4 - Hannah K

The first example I have is a Budweiser magazine advertisement. In this image, a sexy girl is laying down as if she is part of the bottle. Her dresses matches the bottle, implying that if you drink this beer, a fine girl will come along with it. The explicit messages being communicated through the advertisement is that it is a young, white, female. She is a very thing, white girl who doesn’t have one ounce of fat on her. The implicit messages being communicated through the advertisement is that if you drink this beer, you will walk home with a beautiful young girl. Her facial expressions and body gestures imply that she is very easy and anyone who drinks this beer will get a girl. They reinforce particular beauty myths because she is very thin. It is very typical for a white girl to be this skinny and more self-conscious. They reinforce dominant “scripts” about gender identities because it looks like she doesn’t have a lot of control over the situation and is ready for whatever the man wants to do with her.

The second example I chose is a Whey Protein magazine advertisement. The explicit messages being communicated through the advertisement is that Whey makes you fit and strong. There is one male model and one female. They are both young, white, and in shape. The implicit messages being communicated through the advertisement is that if you use Whey, you will grow strong muscles and get more girls. And for girls, the message is that if you take this you will get a strong boy. This advertisement reinforces particular beauty myths because once again, the white girl is extremely skinny. Her skin doesn’t have one imperfection on it. This advertisement reinforces dominant “scripts” about gender identities because the man is the one with his arm around her, making him look in control.

Over the past century, advertisements have put women and colored people on a lower step. In advertisements with women and men, men are always seen in the controlling position. In both of these articles, the men were in control. Although the Budweiser advertisement didn’t have a man in the picture, the women looked like she was out of control. This is very wrong as a culture we should change these demeaning pictures.

Part Two: The advertisement I chose for this was a Nivea Dove magazine page. This advertisement works against reinforcing dominant myths of what constitutes beauty because the myth is the United States is skinny white girls. The eleven women models in this advertisement all have excess body fat and imperfect skin. This norm of beauty also constitutes imperfect skin; in this advertisement one of the women has a big tattoo on her stomach and other women have imperfections on their face or other body parts. Their hair is done but not perfect. One woman even has dreads and it looks awesome! This advertisements works against dominant messages about normative gender and sexuality because the women in this advertisement range from all different ethnicities and color. Every single model in this picture is a women, and they all look happy and in control of their own body. There isn’t a man controlling them and they all love it. If I was creating my own advertisement, I would only have women models that all looked comfortable in their “imperfect” bodies. These women are embracing their “overweight” bodies. This empowers women because it gives the women viewer a sense of control and security. Women always come across as in control which is not something us women should believe completely.

Week 4 blog- Lexi Wendt

Part One:The first advertisement, the one for Sisley, is supposed to show two women "obsessing" over clothes. However, their way of portraying these women being "fashion junkies" is by implying that they are snorting the clothes up, as if it were cocaine. Notice how the only sex that is present in this advertisement is female, assuming that they are the only fashion junkies. Obviously shown is the way the two women look extremely high, and their deteriorating weight.

The Valentino advertisement shows a man and a woman obviously promoting the sunglasses. But the man is forcefully ho

lding the woman's jaw, and she is shown with a pouty look on her face. The man seems as if he is powerful and is forcefully whispering something to her. The woman could potentially be seen as unhappy in the advertisement.

There are many underlying meanings for both of these advertisements. In the Sisley ad, one may take the model's skinniness and the implication of cocaine as women's desire to stay thin. This reinforces the beauty myth about white women's desire to be thin. Also, the implication of drugs could be targeting the modeling industry for models all being so skinny. The Valentino add, which shows the man grasping the woman's jaw, may be trying to imply that man has power over the woman. It is showing the dominant race as being man, and not showing the woman fighting back. Instead she is just letting it happen. He looks unsatisfied with her, and she looks unhappy about that.

Part Two: This Nike ad shows a woman who is very in shape, but who claims that her butt is big. However, she has seemed to embrace this and does not care what people think about it. I think that this advertisement goes against the dominant advertisements that show women and "beauty" because although this woman is very in shape, she is no where along the lines of the typical model skinny, and because is clearly states that if people don't like the way her butt is, they are "...invited to kiss it." If I were to create an advertisement that was supposed to empower women and men, then they would both be portrayed equally as strong as each other. There would be no body language to imply that one sex held power over the other, and there would be no provocative use of drugs, sex, or partying.

WS 200: Week 4

WS 200: Week 4: "LEARNING MODULE THREE For this week, please POST a NEW blog vs. COMMENT under this blog posting. PART ONE: Search the web and f..."

Week 4

LEARNING MODULE THREE

For this week, please POST a NEW blog vs. COMMENT under this blog posting.  

PART ONE:

Search the web and find TWO magazine advertisements that you think are representative of the issues being raised in your readings and class this week.  Now attach these to your blog posting.  Then, in 3 paragraphs analyze the content in the selected images.  What are both explicit and implicit (obvious and less obvious) messages being communicated through the advertisements (re: gender, sexuality, class, race, etc.). How do they reinforce particular beauty myths? (use your readings)  How do they reinforce (or not) dominant “scripts” about gender identities and relationships.

PART TWO:

Now find one advertisement (and attach it) that you think works against reinforcing dominant myths of what constitutes beauty, and against dominant messages about normative gender and sexuality.  Then, in 1 paragraph, tell us why?  If you were creating your own advertisement what might you include or feature in order to empower women and men?