The Representation Of Women During Twentieth Century Listerine Ads

Jean Kilbourne is an advocate for women and is leading a movement to change the way women are viewed in advertising. She opens up the curtains to reveal the hard truth we choose to ignore or even are too obtuse to notice. Women are objectified, materialized, and over-sexualized in order to sell clothes, products, ideas and more. As a woman, I agree with the position Kilbourne presents throughout her documentary Killing Us Softly 4: The Advertising’s Image of Women (2010) and her TEDx Talk The Dangerous Ways Ads See Women (2014.) She demonstrates time and again that these advertisements are dangerous and lead to unrealistic expectations of women.

In 2013, the line of cleaning products, Swiffer released an advertisement for their product called SteamBoost, a mop that uses a steaming pad to clean dirt. The company used an image that depicted the historical figure Rosie the Riveter by dressing a model in a dark blue shirt, red bandana, red lipstick, and a determined expression. This advertisement was found on Huffington Post that was published in June 2013 after twitter user, Heather Beschizza commented on the advertisement by using the hashtag “sexist” (Gray, 2013). After Heather’s tweet was caught by another popular blogging site, Boing Boing, Swiffer received a heavy load of backlash.

Pozner reinforces Devor because they both talk about how advertisers use sexism in order to advertise to women. Craig argues that advertisers play with the stereotype that women are suppose to be perfect in order to get a man. Craig says “As in the Weight Watchers Commercials, it is the woman’s body that is portrayed as the source of the man’s attraction.” Based on Craig, advertisers advertise in a way that make women believe that to have a man, they must have a perfect body. Pozner enforces Craig’s argument by arguing that advertisers use women insecurities to advertise their products. Pozner says that Rebecca Traister says ”advertisers have always told us to hate our bodies...the message is “love your ass but not the fat no it.” Advertisers

Imagine yourself living in the 1800s. Think of all of the inventions that made life easier, such as the telephone to communicate over long distances, or the typewriter to write formal letters to people. These were all important inventions that made life easier, but a biologist by the name of Joseph Lister had made some important discoveries in antiseptics that ended up saving the lives of people. In this paper, I will inform you about Lister’s early life and the degrees he earned from his educational background, his major contribution to the biological community and what people knew before his contribution, the scientists that inspired him and helped him, how knowledge of antiseptics has increased over time,

Authors Steve Craig and Jennifer L. Pozner focus on the roles proposed on women according to popular commercials, and their effects on society as a whole. In sociology, there is a term used to describe one who is not able to fulfill their social role: anomie. In order to make a product appealing to their target audience, businesses focus on their stereotypical and psychological wants and needs that drive individuals to be part of a whole and not feel as an anomie. In Craig’s analysis of Women’s Men he argues, “Although at one level the Secret woman is portrayed as a

Alex Perez commented for a follow up on a question that Media uses conventional wisdom to manipulate what we listen to or care about by using wording, which is much like Listerine in the 1920’s which was mentioned in the chapter. They made ads as a solution for “chronic halitosis”—a then obscure medical term for bad breath because they weren’t much of a success beforehand. Listerine’s new ads featured young women and men, eager for marriage but turned off by their rotten breath. Which the Company's revenue increased due to their product being sold. Or the Atlanta police who to seem less violent for the upcoming olympics that were being hosted there, So each year thousands of crime reports were either downgraded from violent to nonviolent or

It was assumed that women were only able to make incidental purchases, and often with a male shadowing her [fig 2]. The advertisements illustrated the idea that women who were characterized outside the home, faced the tasks they were labeled with, such as shopping for the home or children, rather than participating in the working force. Advertisements also displayed women as a dependent individual that strives to obtain a man’s protection and acceptance at all time. This became a recurring theme found in magazine advertisements through the insinuation that a women needed to please her husband with every task to completed, by cooking a correct meal or washing his clothes using the correct detergent. The concept of always wanting to please your spouse tied perfectly with the mass consumption of beauty products, women feared the idea of not being beautiful enough for their husbands because there was always a chance he may get rid of her for a wife that would know how to please him (cite).

In her fourth installment of “Killing Us Softly”, Jean Kilbourne explores the image of women that American advertising industries have created in our society. Kilbourne breaks down the trends that advertisements constantly reinforce for women throughout the decades, and criticizes the impossible standards that women are shamed into trying to achieve. She allows us to take a deeper look at the exploitative, sexist, and misogynistic tendencies embedded in commercial culture, which is presented everywhere we look. Proceeding to emphasize that these ads have damaging effects in the real world, leading to violence against women, eating disorders, and low self esteem. Furthermore, Kilbourne acknowledges that although things have changed through the

In addition, advertising used traditional images to persuade women to work in the house for their families. Soapmakers made specialized soaps for certain purposes, like cleaning, to gain more consumers (Sivulka, “Cleanliness” 48). In their advertising for these specialized products, soapmakers often used the image of a housewife to appeal to the middle class female audience who bought and used these products (Sivulka, “Soap” 226-227). With the image of a housewife next to a cleaning product, the target audience understood that only women used the product. Soap advertisements conveyed the message that women belong at home in order to properly care for their families while striving to remain as beautiful as

Advertising and Societies: Global Issues. New York, NY: Peter Land, Inc., 2003. Rpt. In Advertising. Ed. Laura K. Egendorf. San Diego: Greenhaven Press, 2006. Opposing Viewpoints. Opposing Viewpoints in Context. Web 30 July 2015

In the 1960’s women only advertised for things made for women, now women are using their bodies to help sell cologne for men. In the 1960’s women would be seen in ads such as Hoover ads and Kenwood chef ads because that was what women did in that time, they cooked and cleaned. These ads showed women to do nothing more. The Kenwood chef ad caption was “The chef does everything but cook- that’s what a wives are for.” This advertisement targets an audience of married men. In the Kenmore Chef ad, the husband is pictured in a suit and he was neatly groomed and his wife was dressed in a conservative outfit with beautiful manicured nails. She is affectionately hugging her husband and the two are both smiling. The image in the ad accurately reflects

In the late 18th century some doctors noticed that being dirty and lacking sanitation increased the rate of infection. It would take 50 years for true progress to start being made in the antisepsis technology as a result of Louis Pasteur’s development of the germ theory. Following this Lister invented a carbolic acid spray, which would be sprayed on wounds and pumped into the air surrounding an operation. Following this many layers of bandages were put on the wounds. Carbolic Acid and simply washing one’s hands was the extent of antiseptics and sterilization at the time of Joseph Lister (“Antiseptics”). Next, antiseptics and sterilization have improved greatly since the times of Joseph Lister. Antibiotics have been developed that can combat infection from within the body, and surgeries and operation have also become safer due to enhanced hygiene. A much larger arsenal of antiseptics have additionally been developed such as hydrogen peroxide, boric acid, iodine, and formaldehyde. Using heat to disinfect materials has also become extremely popular and can be used to sterilize a wide variety of materials

Everyday we expose ourselves to thousands of advertisements in a wide variety of environments where ever we go; yet, we fail to realize the influence of the implications being sold to us on these advertisements, particularly about women. Advertisements don’t just sell products; they sell this notion that women are less of humans and more of objects, particularly in the sexual sense. It is important to understand that the advertising worlds’ constant sexual objectification of women has led to a change in sexual pathology in our society, by creating a culture that strives to be the unobtainable image of beauty we see on the cover of magazines. Even more specifically it is important to study the multiple influences that advertisements have

Individuals played a pivotal role in the advancement of medicine and surgery. The mid-19th century saw a breakthrough with anaesthetics, but despite this surgery was still seen as a dangerous and painful procedure. Operations were carried out in unhygienic conditions and surgical equipment and lab coats were not sterilised between operations which led to fatal infections that killed many patients. Intrigued over the cause of infection, Lister began his work on antisepsis. After reading Pasteur’s research on the Germ Theory he concluded that airborne germs caused infections and decided to experiment with Carbolic acid, a disinfectant used to treat sewage. In 1865 he used carbolic acid for the first time on an 11 year old patient and was

On television commercials, billboards, the radio, public transportation advertisements, planes, the internet, and almost everywhere people go there is always directed broadcasting of advertisements for companies to sell their product; a product that is never promoted for all of the general public to use, but instead to emphasize on specific categories of consumption . Whether it may be categorized in the decadent, the money saving, health, cleaning, cooking, automotive, or whatever sub category it may be; and bigger roles that play in to commercialism are gender roles . Men and women have very different lifestyles, what they buy, do, consume, and produce. As stated in Gender Role Behaviors and Attitudes, “Popular conceptions of femininity