Patsy Kelly in "There Goes My Heart".
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Showing posts with label ADVERTISING. Show all posts
Showing posts with label ADVERTISING. Show all posts
The Codes of Gender: Identity and Performance in Pop Culture
Directed by Sut Jhally
Media Education Foundation
The main theme of The Codes of Gender is “commercial realism.” As explained by the narrator of this film, Sut Jhally, Professor of Communication at the University of Massachusetts, a code of gender has to be understood as a shorthand language, a set of rules and behaviors. This is how Jhally analyzes the ways in which both women and men are portrayed in advertisements and on the covers of glossy magazines.
The film is based on the works of the Canadian social anthropologist Erving Goffman, who was born in Alberta in 1922. His greatest contribution to social theory and to gender representation was the analysis of visual communication between spectators, the subjects of their attention and how attitudes about gender are shaped by culture and society.
The film starts with an explanation of the difference between biological sex identity and constructed gender identity, which leads to the process of contrasting these identities in magazine advertising for commercial films. Gender expressions on magazine covers are skillfully manipulated to reflect the identity of women and men– not as they are, but how they should be, according to a societal norm. The women in the advertisements are posed in awkward positions. They lie down with their heads tilted off balance, stand on one leg, or kneel to suggest powerlessness, submission and dependence. Women become sexualized and accepting of their helplessness, embodying both men’s desire and subordination to them. In contrast, men are portrayed as active. Their poses suggest power, strength, and control.
As an example, Professor Jhally uses a clip from the Seinfield TV series that shows the lead character dating an attractive woman with hands that are big, rough, and strong, like the ‘normal’ hands of a man. Jerry Seinfield is put off by the image and loses interest in the woman.
A second example is Danica Patrick, an American auto racing driver, who is also an athlete and therefore does not fit with the stereotypical image of ‘natural’ femininity. But Patrick is portrayed on the magazine covers in the same way as other women. She lies down, ready to be gazed at–weak and submissive. Paul Marciano, founder of Guess, is portrayed as selecting images of passive women for Guess advertisements, as if he was making a statement that ‘women should know their place.’
Another striking feature of the visual images is the association of women with childhood. As though they never left this part of their lives behind, in commercials women are frequently portrayed as childlike, with fingers in their mouths. Women's posture with men is that of father and daughter: constantly hiding behind men, snuggling with men for protection, or resting their heads on men’s arms in sweet and helpless positions. Men, on the contrary, are shown in straight posture, muscular and strong, and project a hyper-masculine image of ‘accepted normality’.
The Codes of Gender will be of interest to all who question the visual images of what is deemed natural and normal. The film is well-made and presented, and it serves as a fitting tribute to Goffman (who died in Philadelphia in 1982). His work was underestimated when he was alive, but his contributions to ‘the codes of gender’ are as equally valid today as they were thirty years ago.
Review by Anna Hamling
Media Education Foundation
The main theme of The Codes of Gender is “commercial realism.” As explained by the narrator of this film, Sut Jhally, Professor of Communication at the University of Massachusetts, a code of gender has to be understood as a shorthand language, a set of rules and behaviors. This is how Jhally analyzes the ways in which both women and men are portrayed in advertisements and on the covers of glossy magazines.
The film is based on the works of the Canadian social anthropologist Erving Goffman, who was born in Alberta in 1922. His greatest contribution to social theory and to gender representation was the analysis of visual communication between spectators, the subjects of their attention and how attitudes about gender are shaped by culture and society.
The film starts with an explanation of the difference between biological sex identity and constructed gender identity, which leads to the process of contrasting these identities in magazine advertising for commercial films. Gender expressions on magazine covers are skillfully manipulated to reflect the identity of women and men– not as they are, but how they should be, according to a societal norm. The women in the advertisements are posed in awkward positions. They lie down with their heads tilted off balance, stand on one leg, or kneel to suggest powerlessness, submission and dependence. Women become sexualized and accepting of their helplessness, embodying both men’s desire and subordination to them. In contrast, men are portrayed as active. Their poses suggest power, strength, and control.
As an example, Professor Jhally uses a clip from the Seinfield TV series that shows the lead character dating an attractive woman with hands that are big, rough, and strong, like the ‘normal’ hands of a man. Jerry Seinfield is put off by the image and loses interest in the woman.
A second example is Danica Patrick, an American auto racing driver, who is also an athlete and therefore does not fit with the stereotypical image of ‘natural’ femininity. But Patrick is portrayed on the magazine covers in the same way as other women. She lies down, ready to be gazed at–weak and submissive. Paul Marciano, founder of Guess, is portrayed as selecting images of passive women for Guess advertisements, as if he was making a statement that ‘women should know their place.’
Another striking feature of the visual images is the association of women with childhood. As though they never left this part of their lives behind, in commercials women are frequently portrayed as childlike, with fingers in their mouths. Women's posture with men is that of father and daughter: constantly hiding behind men, snuggling with men for protection, or resting their heads on men’s arms in sweet and helpless positions. Men, on the contrary, are shown in straight posture, muscular and strong, and project a hyper-masculine image of ‘accepted normality’.
The Codes of Gender will be of interest to all who question the visual images of what is deemed natural and normal. The film is well-made and presented, and it serves as a fitting tribute to Goffman (who died in Philadelphia in 1982). His work was underestimated when he was alive, but his contributions to ‘the codes of gender’ are as equally valid today as they were thirty years ago.
Review by Anna Hamling
Getting Real: Challenging the Sexualisation of Girls
Edited by Melinda Tankard ReistSpinifex Press
Getting Real is a collection of essays that are charges against the worldwide phenomena of the pornification of childhood through advertising, marketing, and pop culture. This was a great book to read, particularly as the authors are Australian and I sometimes wonder how much of our collective reaction to porn and adult images going mainstream is a reflection of our country's Puritanical leanings. For the contributors to Getting Real, the problem is embedded not just in faux-feminism but also a twisting of feminism by marketers and others to make women believe that if they are "in charge" of their sexuality, then there isn't anything wrong with stripping, making out with other women to turn men on, and so forth.
About half way through the book I came across a few statements that made me think, "Wait a minute...This isn't a feminist book!" There's just a tinge of anti-sex sentiment in some essays. So I did some investigating and found that editor Melinda Tankard Reist is part of a women's think tank. Upon further digging, I came to the conclusion that the Women's Forum Australia seems to be what one might get if the National Organization for Women and the Independent Women's Forum had a lefty baby. (If anyone has more information about them, I'd love for you to leave it in the comments.)
While some essays wade into slut-shaming and defaming strippers and sex workers, on the whole Getting Real is a pretty good book. One eye-opening essay on street billboards makes the point that even though it is illegal for people to have porn in the workplace, we have to walk through porn-infested streets on a daily basis. Another essay brought up how many of us are using Flickr and YouTube to share our children's lives, which teaches them to perform publicly. There is also a discussion about the medicalization of girls' bodies. From HPV vaccines to plastic surgery, it's all there to ponder.
The best part of Getting Real was learning a new term: corporate pedophilia. "Sexualizing products being sold specifically for children, and children themselves being presented in images or directed to act in advertisements in ways modeled on adult sexual behavior." This goes far beyond the dress-up of our youth to performance on a daily basis. "The task for today's teenagers is to win back their freedom from the adults who run the advertising agencies and girls magazines and the 'sex-positive' media academics who insist that 'bad girls' are powerful girls."
The essays are well cited, but avoid a lot of academic jargon, making Getting Real a quick read. The book is feminist, but with a dash of moderate conservatism thrown in. The topic brings together some typically opposing forces, and that's always good for the discussion.
Review by Veronica I. Arreola
Cross-posted from Viva La Feminista
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Sony Unveils BRAVIA - Drome Zoetrope !
From Geek.Com
Like all other LCD televions Sony’s BRAVIA line will be a a favorite pick this holiday season. Unlike everyone else though Sony’s advertising spots have set the televisions apart from the competition more than a larger panel or improved backlighting ever could. Their famous advertising spots (specifically the Balls, Paint, and Play-Doh rabbits) touting BRAVIA’s “color like no other” have been viewed by millions of people on YouTube and has gained mention as some of the best commercials for any consumer electronics product.
Sony is back again, teamed up with the Fallon London advertising agency and soccer star Kaka for another ambitious commercial spot. This time it’s a 10m zoetrope that spins at over 40 kph, which Sony is calling the Bravia-drome. The purpose of the Bravia-drome is to show off Sony’s new Motionflow technology. MotionFlow allows BRAVIA televisions to insert transitional images into action sequences in order to increase smoothness at 240Hz that might otherwise be choppy, like high-speed sports (think a slapped hockey puck or kicked soccer ball).
The zoetrope in action
The ad was filmed in Italy, outside of Turin, with a huge crew and lots of extras. This time the shooting of the commercial is not so much the challenge as was the building of the zoetrope. The 10-ton structure took six weeks to build and took ten men about three days to assemble at the shooting location.
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