Blog assignment & Reflection 5
1) 2009 University of Oklahoma Visitor Guide, magazine.
- The advertisements included in the visitor guide were generally aimed at college students who are considering attending OU. There is an ad for the OU IT store on campus. The only black student is a black man dressed in a collared shirt sitting next to a group of white men all dressed the same. There are no other ethnicities portrayed on the page besides all white people.
2) Glamour, magazine.
- The cover is of an attactive white female. Throughout the publication, there are various ads for the Candie's brand. The white woman in the middle of the picture with roller skates on is the first thing you see. As you look in the background, you can see that she is accomapanied by one hispanic friend and one African American friend. Their faces are less noticable and almost blurry-like.
3) The Bachelor, television.
- As I was watching re-runs online, the only African American woman that was included as a bachelorette was a woman that had straight hair, light skin and had all the traits of a white woman.
4) Ebony, magazine.
- The majority of ads in this magazine featured African American men and women. The majority of the women portrayed didn't look like the typical black woman. They all had straight hair and lighter skin. Hispanic women were the other race in these ads.
5) Better Homes and Gardens, magazine.
-Throughout the entire 21 pages of this magazine, I only came across one ad with an African American person in it. This magazine is typically aimed at families and no minority families are in the ads. The one ad that had a black person in it is of an African American child for ADHD. He is in a baseball uniform with other white players surrounding him.
6) Church's Chicken, commerical.
-The commercial showed all African American women employees with all white female customers.
7) Lucky, magazine.
- An ad for Lucky Brand Jeans was a collage of different people's faces. Only around the edges, surround the rest of the faces, were the colored faces. They basically made up a border for the white faces. As if to minimize the appearance of the minority faces.
8) People, magazine.
-A CoverGirl ad with Halle Berry. Light-skinned, white-featured African American woman selling make-up.
9) NCAA basketball events, television.
-I was paying close attention to all of the African American cheerleaders. All seemed to have straight, white-like hair.
10) Project Runway, television.
-The African American and Asian models that have on the show all have white features.
Reflection--
The short paragraph from Coltrane was very enlightening to me in regards to the way media essentially sells things. Things that make up our economy, everyone's economy. The first thing ad that popped into my head, and subsequently one that I found in a magazine, was the Halle Berry ad for CoverGirl. I can only imagine how young African American girls were shaped after being exposed to that ad. Halle Berry has everything "white" that you could imagine, she's just got darker skin than a white woman. Not only was the ad telling you that the image of a beautiful African American woman is light-skinned, but is also drilled into women's heads that they must wear make-up in order to be beautiful.
Another ad, the ad that I found in Better Homes and Gardens of the young black boy. Throughout the ENTIRE magazine, and believe me I flipped through every page hoping that I wasn't actually coming to this realization, there was only ONE advertisement with a black person in it. I wouldn't have included the ad into this assignment if it weren't for this... the young black boy was wearing a baseball uniform with the matching hat. This portrayed to me that A) yes, this magazine is willing to put ONE ad with a black person in it but 2) the black kid had to be portrayed as an "all American boy" (as any white kid may be portrayed)" You all might take it another way, but that's the way the ad translated in my head.
If you take, for example, the Dallas Cowboy cheerleaders you will notice something. I'm only able to pick out seven African American cheerleaders. This gets hard becuase if you were able to zoom in on this picture, it's hard to distinguish a few of them. They all portray the "white standard of beauty," none of them stand out in their diverse ways. I just thought this was interesting.After this assignment, I will no longer be able to flip through a magazine or watch a television commerical without realizing how much products and services are directed at white people and how the standard of white beauty is drilled into our minds unconsciously.
That sounds like awareness to me?
ReplyDeleteLike you I found many of the same findings. Before this assignment I was unaware of the extent to which magazines are NOT incorporating different races and ethnicities in their magazines advertisements. I usually flip right past the ads because I think they are extremely annoying, but this assignment opened my eyes and ever since I have not been able to read a magazine without noticing the ads and their lack of diversity.
ReplyDeleteHopefully this will change, I believe everyone needs to see themselves depicted in the media.
I found many of the same examples as you. One in particular that stuck out to me was a Cover Girl advertisement that featured Rihanna and she had many Caucasian features. Her hair was straight, her skin looked lighter and really she didn't even look like herself. In the article that dealt with 1990s commercials, it stated that the reason African American women or women of other races were not in beauty ads because the brands didn't want to lose their white customers. I thought this was so sad because really they should be targeting the minorities nowadays due to the huge increase of minorities in America. Beauty products should emphasize the best features of every woman and not try to make all of the models look like they are Caucasian if they really aren't. I also agree with your comment about young girls of ethnic background that look at these ads and probably believe they need to look like these models. Instead, we should be a society that puts an emphasis on having your own PERSONAL beauty. Your traits and characteristics make you who you are, but our society and media have set standards on how we should look and act. I hope there is a day where the media doesn't have a huge impact on our society like they do today.
ReplyDeleteI could not agree more with one of Devon's last statement, "after this assignment, I will no longer be able to flip through a magazine or watch a television commerical without realizing how much products and services are directed at white people and how the standard of white beauty is drilled into our minds unconsciously." I feel like I somewhat noticed the stereotypes and unequal representation of races throughout magazines especially women's magazines directed at fashion and beauty. After this assignment I can't help but notice the unequal representations and stereotypes in every kind of advertising; billboards, commercials, tv shows, magazines, pamphlets etc. I think its terribly sad for the minorities to not only feel under-represented but also not have any advertisements to feel accepted by. I mean that a African-American female should be proud of her looks and features and not feel like in order to beautiful or be accepted she must be light skinned with straight hair in order to look more white or posses more white features.
ReplyDeleteDevon – First of all, I completely agree with you when you say you will no longer be able to look through a magazine or view commercials in the same way. What is GOOD about this is the fact that we are becoming those critical consumers, the ones that call for a higher standard from the companies we support and the products we purchase. It is this call to action that will require organizations to start making changes and take steps forward toward real progress in regards to stereotyping certain groups in their marketing and advertising strategies. While I try to remember that advertisers are indeed, trying to reach specific target audiences, it is vital that we always remember that there are larger issues and messages pervading the content of media such as the ones you described. These aren’t simply headshots of a celebrities or ads for jeans. As you pointed out in your analysis, many of the features of African-American women have been practically redesigned (and I use this term because that is exactly what media producers are doing to their models, etc.) to fit a single standard. What worries me to my core is that the root of this standard has absolutely no clout in reality. Why one group of people thinks they can label not just individuals, but gigantic GROUPS as more beautiful or more ideal than others is beyond me.
ReplyDelete