Friday, February 27, 2015

Post 5 (or, an exploration of gender stereotypes)

Gender stereotypes may possibly be most visible in advertisements for cleaning products and food items, especially restaurants. Fast food restaurants such as Carl's Jr. predominantly employ attractive, skinny, white women in their campaigns. A quick Google search of "Carl's Jr. Ads" brings up pages and pages of images of women in bikinis eating Carl's Jr. burgers. The disconnect is obvious: why are these women, dressed as they are, eating burgers in sexual postures? Obviously the ads are working because sex sells but they are effective because they reduce women to being sexual objects juxtaposed with a product.

On the household side, ads for appliances or cleaning products generally tend to depict women who desire to purchase them so that they can clean and maintain the home. For instance, this Bosch appliances advertisement shows the evolution of their appliances between the years 1886 and 2011. What is interesting is that instead of showing a male in the most recent ads, the company decided to show women standing next to their appliances which reinforces the notion that women were responsible for household chores in the 1880s and still are today.

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