Friday 31 March 2023

Compare how representations reflect the time in which adverts are made. Refer to the Tide print advert you have studied and the Dove advert you have been provided with



Underline the key terms


Compare how representations reflect the time in which adverts are made. Refer to the Tide print advert you have studied and the Dove advert you have been provided with


Knee jerk reaction


The representation of women in advertising has changed dramatically over time, in terms of representations of ethnicity, sexualisation, and the idea of hegemonic attractiveness 


Plan


Layout

Pick and mix identity

Stuart Hall

Stereotypes 

Postcolonialism 

Van Zoonen

Feminism 

Bell Hooks

Male gaze

Intersectional feminism 

Judith Butler 

Gender performativity 

Dress codes

Sexualisation 

Genre

Conventions 

Representation

Parasocial relationships

Lexis

Hyperreality

Polysemy

Modes of address

Mise en scene

Intertextuality 

Comic 

Romance

Cultivation

Uses and grats

Slogan

Target audience 

The Z line rule

Direct mode of address

Sans serif font

Mid shot

Older vs younger audiences

Race

Diversity

Diverse target audience

International audience

White backgrounds

Binary oppositions



Introduction


DAC - definition, argument, context


Representation refers to the re-presentation of an event, issues, places, or a group of people. Representations reconstruct reality, and representations always reflect the ideology of the producer. Producers will encode their ideology in representations to position them in a variety of different ways. In this essay, I shall argue that the representation of women have dramatically changed over time, from the stereotypical , simple and straightforward representations of the 1950s to the more complex and perhaps empowering representations of now. I shall also argue that representations demonstrate inequalities of power, and that women in many ways are still represented as subordinate. In order to explore this idea, I shall be referring to The Tide Advert, produced by Procter and Gamble in the 1950s in America, and the Dove Soap advert. 


Paragraphs


PEA - Point, evidence, argument 


Paragraph examples/discussion/etc here


  • Sexualisation ‘ one way in which the representation of women have completely changed over time is through the respective difference in sexualisation in these adverts

  • Postcolonialism and the use of the colour white

  • Hegemonic representations of female beauty 

  • Lexis and genre conventions 



Examples


  • The MES of the white costumes constructs a binary opposition between clothing and the women themselves. This reinforces exactly how revealing these costumes are, and constructs not only a highly sexualised representation of women, but also constructs a fetishistic mode of address. This sexualisation is a classic example of the male gaze, and confirms that sex and hegemonically attractive women have always been used to sell products

  • The MES of costume in each advert is radically different, and constructs wholly different representations of women . For example in the Tide advert, the housewife is wearing the MES of a stereotypically girly, feminine white dress. This costume is stereotypical of 1950s house wives, and is symbolic of the hegemonically clean and pristine image that was seen as being desirable. Anchored with the MES of her heavy makeup and the iconography of her practical yet stylish haircut, a highly conservative representative representation of women is constructed. This straightforward representation would appeal to the 50s American target audience, by cultivating certain ideological perspectives.

  • Contemporary audiences would identify the genre conventions of propaganda, which are designed to encode a patriotic mode of address.