Gender Roles in Pop Culture Essay

Since the emergence of advertising in American culture one thing that has remained constant is the visible truth that men and women are portrayed differently. In consideration to the evolution of man kind gender roles have evolved immensely throughout time, although advertisements have not kept up with this process of evolution. Companies to this day use their tactics and skills to reach out to specific genders such as pretty fonts with a stylish message, while advertisements towards men portray the character as strong and intimidating. The typical viewer can easily spot the difference in the portrayal of genders. Men are portrayed this way because the viewers look up to these characters, they want to be

What is it that drives commercials towards their target audience? Commercials can be for a certain age, race, and sometimes even a certain gender. Pop culture has influenced the minority groups and shed light to women 's rights or so it was thought. Lisa Shaffer a fellow student feels otherwise and believes that Pop culture has only defended traditional values and does little to challenge those who already have power . Commercials bring in gender norms and in Steve Craig’s article, “Men’s Men and Women’s Women” he speaks on four particular TV ads directed towards a particular gender. What is interesting is it shows a false image of the opposite sex to the audience being portrayed toward their preferences. It is the image the audience wants to see that appeals to them. This is all in an attempt to sell their products and take advantage of our desires and anxieties. Craig shows commercials brings gender norms that produce the ideas of what a man’s man and a woman’s woman which is why he would agree with Shaffer because it promotes an old way of thinking.

Contemporary visual media contributes to the social construction of gender in that the way that men and women are portrayed in advertising is vastly different.

What is it that drives commercials towards their target audience? Commercials can be aimed toward certain age, race, along with certain gender groups. Pop culture has influenced minority groups and shed light on women 's rights or so it may seem. Lisa Shaffer a fellow student feels otherwise and believes that Pop culture has only defended traditional values and does little to challenge those who already have power . Commercials bring in gender norms and in Steve Craig’s article, “Men’s Men and Women’s Women” he speaks on four particular TV ads directed towards male and female audiences. Interestingly enough these tv ads deliver a false image of the opposite sex to the audience catering to their preferences. It is the image of what the audience wants to see that appeals to them. This is all in an attempt to sell products and take advantage of our desires and anxieties. Craig shows how commercials bring gender norms that produce the stigmas of a man’s man and a woman’s woman, which makes it apparent that he would agree with Shaffer because it promotes an old way of thinking.

In the short article by Steve Craig, Men’s Men and Women’s Womens, the author gives an important special to how television commercials portray gender to different audiences. He describes how an advertisers creates their attractive advertisement to appeal either male or females consumers.An advertisement that targets a specific gender to give interest to the gender to consume their product. Secondly, specific advertisement are played at select times to be seen by a specific set of people. But most importantly television programming is gendered by creating advertisements with considering their target audience needs and to give pleasure to their fantasies. I agree with this type of method to attract society to make money.

Media is a powerful agent in entertaining children. It also influences and teaches the youth of society the suitable and appropriate gender roles that they inevitably try to make sense of. The power of media is very influential especially in the minds of the youth. Disney movies target the youth and plant certain ideas and concepts about social culture into the vulnerable minds of children. Media uses gender to its advantage, just like Disney productions. Humorous caricatures reveal some harsh realities about the portrayal of Disney Princesses in many movies made by the Walt Disney Company. Disney mixes innocence with the ultimate form of fantasy to capture an audience. Predominantly, Disney helps highlight the gender roles by showing the

The use of sexualization also reinforces a pattern of gender roles that are currently circulating throughout advertisements. More often than not, women who are used as ploys in ads are seen doing household chores like vacuuming, changing the toilet paper, or making coffee. Females are rarely ever seen in a work place, and definitely not in a powerful position. In fact, the directors of most of these ads place women below or behind the man to show who has the power in actuality. Women are seen as skinny, fragile, and immobile in high heels, while men are strong and powerful. By setting up such a strong binary between the two different groups, it is obvious that the majority of the American society will not be able to fit into these roles, and it leaves a sense of rejection for the average person. This rejection, accepted by the viewers, manifests

Sexist ads show that society is dominated by the same masculine values that have controlled the image of women in the media for years. Sexist advertisement reinforces gender stereotypes and roles, or uses sex appeal to sell products, which degrades the overall public perception of women. The idea that sexism is such a rampant problem comes from the stereotypes that are so deeply embedded into today’s society that they almost seem to be socially acceptable, although they are nowhere near politically correct. Images that objectify women seem to be almost a staple in media and advertising: attractive women are plastered all over ads. The images perpetuate an image of the modern woman, a gender stereotype that is reinforced time and time again by the media. These images are accepted as “okay” in advertising, to depict a particular product as sexy or attractive. And if the product is sexy, so shall be the consumer. In the 1970s, groups of women initially took issue with the objectification of women in advertisements and with the limited roles in which these ads showed women. If they weren’t pin-ups, they were delicate

In Craig's article, the author explores how advertising views men and women as separate consumer markets and appeals to both of them at separate times. Gender roles are heavily influential when creating commericials for each respective market. Craig details this through an analysis of beer ads

A commercial is one of the advertisements that we could see in life. When you turn on television, you could see a lot of commercials before programs start. In Men’s Men and Women’s Women, Steve Craig, an author, claims that “advertisers seem quite willing to manipulate … fantasies and exploit our anxieties, especially those concerning our gender identities.” However, Stan Hope disagrees since he assumes that “the ads he describes are just light hearted to stories designed to entertain, rather than exploit. Consumers are way too smart to be so easily manipulated in any case.” Advertisements could just describe stores for entertainment like Hope said. However, advertisers should think carefully about gender identities because men and women’s favors are different.

Throughout the years, advertisements have influenced and supported the cultural myth of gender roles to society. Advertisements that demonstrate men and women in their traditional roles can affect an individual’s perception. First, they might focus their products on individuals that still believe in traditional gender roles. Second, they might have society talking about the modern approach that the product is being advertised. Various cultures have made men and women believe what roles they should be doing. Unfortunately, many advertisements still show the idea that men are the providers and women are the housewives. However, since today we are gradually adapting and beginning to live in a modern world, the gender role myth is starting to slowly change in advertisements as men are beginning to take on traditional female roles that are considered less masculine and women have adopted male roles. The Le Creuset advertisement supports and rejects the traditional female gender role myth by demonstrating a father and a daughter both taking the position of a traditional female.

In recent discussion of the drastic marketing campaigns that companies utilize a controversial issue whether the massive growth of popular culture in today’s diverse society has created a need for mass advertisement and marketing. From this perspective, advertisement and marketing companies continue to exploit the slogan “Sex Sells.” Advertisement campaigns continue to target women as a sex object for men’s sexual prejudice. The main idea behind this campaign is that men’s needs are more important and significant, and women’s are not. Advertisement and marketing campaigns have gone too far and they devalue women. As Steve Craig said in his article “Men’s Men and Women’s Women”: “Advertisers therefore portray different images of men and women in order to exploit the different deep-seated motivations and anxieties connected to gender identity” (189). What Steve Craig refers to is that

Real Lives of Most Men." He says to a friend of his "This must be a

The roles of males and females in society have significantly changed, as opposed to the predominant roles in our history. In the modern culture of today, women have begun to break out of the mold that which society has placed her in. This much can’t be said when it comes to modern gender representation in mass media advertising. It can be safe to state that woman are seen as sexual, fragile, exotic—whereas men are portrayed as tough, in control, and aggressive. This trend can be one seen as an inhibitor to the advancement of our culture, because especially for women, it is hard to pull away from the stereotypes that are continuously represented. As examples of the given trend, the following

Today advertisements are criticised for their portrayal of gender, sexuality, minorities and subaltern classes. Media Ethics and Social Responsibility focus on these areas and say why it is happening. Advertisements of sanitary napkins, cosmetics, kitchen appliances and other such products women are the main highlight. In most of the ads they are portrayed in a stereotypical manner. Ads are now profit oriented.