Research Topic

I think it would be really interesting to trace the history of make up. I’ll choose a make up company that’s been around for awhile (Maybelline, Cover Girl, Almay, etc.) and research it’s advertising history as well as the attitudes and fashions of women during each time period. It may be interesting to focus on one item of make up in particular, like lipstick, and see how it has been advertised differently over time.

Another item I’m thinking about researching is the razor blade (for men). I always see olde schoole pictures of men shaving with actual knives; it would be interesting to see how the razor evolved from an actual blade to the convenient little tool we know so well today. It would be hard to pinpoint the moment in history when men actually started shaving, but I could begin my research with the creation of the first razor blade company (Gillette?).  Again, I would also reasearch the fashions and attitudes of men at the time.

Beauty (Re)discovers the Male Body

1.)  Bordo’s witty and thoughtful interjections make this 45 page essay a bearable read. For example, after talking about the Gucci ad for some length, she dives into a personal story about how she wanted one of her lovers to strip for her but was to embarrassed to ask him. She relates this personal anecdote back to the idea of cultural models and accepted behavior of the sexes. Bordo never allots an entire section to the topic of homosexuality, but rather sprinkles it throughout the essay: she starts off the essay by addressing homosexuality (she even admits to a slight infatuation with Anne Heche!), she later mentions Calvin Klein’s bisexuality and how it affects his advertisement choices, then describes the androgynous “leaners”, and later talks about Symposium and it’s homosexual plot line as well as the acceptable homosexual practices in ancient Rome. If Bordo had written page after page about the subtle (and sometimes not-so-subtle) homosexual subtexts in advertising, the reader would have been bored out of their mind. Though she discusses “Male Decorativeness in Cultural Perspectives” at length, she breaks it up by throwing in pop culture references (James Bond), her own sarcastic tone of voice (puh-lease!), and lets not forget the insertion of, “a real dangerous muthafucka”. Her analysis is thorough and accurate, though it does not read like a history essay. The change in pace, insertion of her own voice, and varying of sentence and paragraph structure allows Bordo’s long essay to be manageable.

2.)  Beauty (Re)Discovers the Male Body is divided into six subsections. The first, “Men on Display”, introduces the subject matter to the readers by throwing an image of a nearly naked man into their faces and then later an image of a fully naked man into their faces. This is one of the shorter sections and certainly succeeds in capturing attention. The second section, “Thanks, Calvin!” is also a quick read which delves into the use of homosexuality in advertising, which in turn describes the current craze for men’s butts being put on display. “Rocks and Leaners” is a bit longer than the previous two sections and describes an oh-so-true phenomenon in advertising. The masculine, intimidating, muscular men (who are often black as well) stare directly into the camera and turn their body forward—these are the “rocks”. The languid, sensual, lean, and sometimes feminine male models often lean on something (or someone) and stare on a bias or away from the camera—these are the “leaners”. After this comes “Honey, What Do I Want to Wear?” which describes the overwhelming heterosexual ad campaign for those men who “don’t care how they look”. The final two sections, “Male Decorativeness in Cultural Perspective” and “My World… and Welcome to It?” are the most lengthy and in-depth of all the sections. In these sections she tackles the history of male fashion, masculine “vanity”, African American males in advertising, male body image, and then wraps the whole thing up with John Travolta. Though the final two sections make up the “heart” of the essay, the previous sections succeed in grabbing the reader’s attention by analyzing the current advertisement trends before delving into semi-boring analysis and a short history lesson.

3.)  Bordo brings up the contradicting value of one’s gaze in her essay. Does someone staring at you make you confident that you look sexy, or does it make you feel self-conscious and inhibited? She uses the concept of “subject position” to interpret the gazes and stares of the males in advertising. In “Rocks and Leaners”, she describes the gaze between the rock and the viewer as a competition—“who will advert his eyes first?”—Whereas the leaner flirts with the viewer with his eyes and invites them to “escape” into their seduction. The “face-off” ads exert masculinity and take authority over the viewer, thereby asserting Satre’s claim that the stares of others create constraints on our ability to be ourselves. The “leaning” ads seduce the audience; they are inviting, and support Beauvoir’s assertion that a man’s flirtatious gaze makes a woman feel whole. Another example of this is when Bordo discusses Berger’s concept of, “men act and women appear”.  She shows a Nautica ad featuring a man too busy on his boat to notice how ruggedly handsome he is, next to an ad of a woman in a little dress happily marinating as three men watch her go by. The truly heterosexual manly-man never shows himself as an object to be gazed at, but a powerful working tool who is always doing something. A woman, however, can show her legs and cleavage whenever she wants, because it is acceptable for women to be stared at—besides, they like it when men gawk at them. By taking these opposing subject positions, Bordo shows the value (or lack of value) that can be placed upon a gaze of another.

4.) This ad is the epitome of Bordo’s essay. The main focus is the man’s body, the product that this ad is selling is only half-way visible in the bottom, right hand corner and the name of product is barely readable. This model is taking the classic “rock” stance, staring directly into the camer, hands on his hips, challenging the viewer to look away.

This Abercrombie ad doesn’t waste any time with the man’s face and gets right down to the nitty-gritty. Besides his partially open fly, we can see a glimpse of his toned abs. This ad doesn’t really advertise anything in particular besides the brand Abercrombie as a whole, but even if it did, would you notice?

Now THIS is my kind of Abercrombie ad…. Neil Abercrombie that is, running to represent Hawaii in congress. He’s a hottie. Look at those toned abs and seductive eyes. He’s got that leaning thing down to an art! I’m surprised Bordo didn’t include this ad in her essay!

Deconstructing Ads: part 2

1940s.                                                                   1980s.

The ad from the 1940s places value on the actual product (it tells us directly that price ranges between $1.50 and $5.00) and the way the product makes the woman feel about herself. She brushes her hair contently and admires her “subtle silhouette” (no pointy-Madonna-cones here). The ad from the 1980s places value on being sexy and mysterious– the “maiden form woman”, the emphasis is appealing to others rather than self. This shift in value is quite apparent. In the first ad, the woman is alone; in the second ad, men surround the woman. In his book The Culture of Narcissism, Christopher Lasch explains the narcissistic personality as “other-directed”, someone who is consumed by the need for other’s praise and approval. This shift to attention-craving personalities is clearly displayed in our advertisements. The cosmetic and lingerie industries make their money off of women’s desires to obtain attention from men. The ad from the 1980s does not feature the price of the underwear because women have such an intense desire to impress that they don’t care how much it costs, as long as they receive it. The process of deconstruction allows the public to see advertising for what it really is: a business. Like any other business, advertisers want to make money. Advertisers feed off of what they know will sell, and they know the insecurities of women are constant and widespread. As long as women let these insecurities stand, advertising will continue to yield more and more power and create even more binding stereotypes.

Deconstructing Ads

The most noticeable thing about this ad is the large amounts of writing. It literally gives advice for specific situations and later recommends the use of Kotex pads for these situations. My 21st century attention span could barely handle the amount of text. This advertisement makes a legitimate argument: Kotex is the most comfortable and discrete, making everyday events more enjoyable. It does not sell sex or narcissism, but merely comfort and happiness. The men and women in the ad are fully clothed and not at all erotic, they’re wholesome and charming. Basically, this ad depicts the social commonalities of the time: courtship, manners, conservative values, stay-at-home-moms and bread-winning dads—you’re basic 1950s conventions. Not to say that every household was a “leave it to Beaver” household, but that was the family stereotype portrayed at the time; much like how the family stereotype now is the mini-van-driving soccer mom who dominates the family as well as the working but unavailable, bumbling father (reference: “The Simpsons” and “Malcom in the Middle”). The media reflects the current societal stereotypes to make the audience feel comfortable and familiar with the subject matter, and by doing so, letting the audience feel more contented in buying the  product.

Cybil Shepard is spread eagle in this ad. The ad is so primarily sexual that the text at the bottom is barely even noticed. When the one finally gets around to reading that this is an advertisement for a sanitary napkin with deodorant, the true scandalous-ness of the ad is realized. To put it bluntly, there is perfume emanating from Cybil’s vagina. Despite it’s vulgarity, this ad is publicly accepted: in magazines, pasted on the sides of buses and buildings, and put on billboards. This blatant display of sexuality emerged in the 1960s partly because of the “free love” movement, partly because of the pot smoking, but mostly because the conventions of society had changed so drastically. This ad sells the Kotex pad as something that will increase a woman’s sexiness (because we all know that a diaper-like-device between your legs is SO sexy) and that this pad will make your vagina smell like a bed of roses, subtly wafting men into an undeniable vortex of sex. For all the ladies reading this, you all know as well as I that there is nothing sexy or aromatic about menstruation. Sorry I had to go there, but it’s true.

Narcissism as Liberation– questions.

1.)    Susan Douglas uses the butt and thigh as tools to illustrate the assumptions and actualities of womanhood. In the 1980s, a round, firm buttock/thigh served as an accomplishment in itself. Accomplishments within the workplace or at home were secondary to achieving a shapely bottom. Clearly, if you have a fat ass, you contribute nothing to society. The womanly assumptions conveyed by the media are that the smoother your face, butt, and thighs are the more actively you pursue success; the more actively you pursue success, the closer you are to being “as good as” a man. Of course, all women want to be the supreme beings that men are. Douglas rejects these unrealistic toned thighs and butts, however she does not denounce exercise. She believes that exercise is a great way to reduce stress, and become stronger and healthier. What she condemns is “sexuality over fitness”.  Corporations found that they could make a larger profit off of beauty rather than fitness with the assumption of women care more about the way they look than the way they feel. Though some women submit to these media standards, Douglas refuses to. She wears her wrinkles with pride: “a woman’s facial lines are the story of her life…. They’ve tracked my joys and sorrows, my failures and successes, and I’m supposed to chop them off so I can look like an empty vessel, a bimbette?” A true image of a woman to Douglas is an image of a woman with “orange peel” skin and bags under her eyes, not wearing her age with sadness and regret, but with acceptance and pride.

2.) Deconstruction is the process in which we look at advertisements and see them for what they are:  the digitally enhanced skin of young and skinny models and pseudo-scientific facts, all wrapped up in a corporate media package. Even though the media is fully responsible for these lying advertisements, we as individuals must use the deconstruction of these ads to determine the meaning of our own womanhood. However, advertising is a business, cosmetics companies continue to make millions of dollars. It’s essentially their job to, for lack of other words, brainwash women into thinking they need make up, and then charge them an arm and a leg for it. Women don’t want to look old or tired because the media predominantly portrays beauty by using young models. Therefore, middle age women who want to look beautiful will pay any amount to look like the models that have been thrown in their faces repeatedly. Douglas explains that this emergence of narcissism occurred during the Reagan era as a solution to forget the political (which the common man could do nothing about) and to focus on self (which can be easily remedied by the individual). Since the 1980s, narcissism has only expanded with the aid of technology. With the growing popularity of the Internet, movies, and television, more and more skinny models are being shoved in our faces; and though we are capable of deconstruction, the overwhelming prevalence of this advertising brainwashing has inhibited our ability to deconstruct each ad.  Deconstruction is the only thing that keeps the image of the “real woman” alive, without it the concept of beauty would be objective. The media is essentially stealing away the beauty from the eye of the beholder and instead pours the same image of beauty into everybody’s eyes.