Still from a 2013 Red Bull commercial:
The winter of 1620 was a devastating one for the colonists who had just arrived from England in New Plymouth. They suffered from scurvy, exposure to the elements, and terrible living conditions. Almost half (45 out of 102) died; only four of the remaining were women.
They made contact with the Wampanoag tribe in March. The tribe taught them how to grow corn and donated food to the colony. Thank to their help, the pilgrims were able to celebrate a harvest, or thanksgiving, that fall. It was attended by the 53 remaining pilgrims and 90 indigenous Americans.
That’s why this Red Bull commercial is so annoying. In the final 12 seconds, you see four pilgrims and two Indians, three women and three men. So, by pure numbers, reversed and heavily female. The turkey is served by a pilgrim, sending the message that the pilgrims were feeding the Indians and not vice versa. It’s a woman, of course, but likely most of the food preparation would have done by men, since they were 77% of the colonist population.
But, it nicely lines up with how we apparently think the world should be today: multicultural but majority white, with women cooking, and everyone paired up in same-race, heterosexual monogamy.
It’s the little things, you know.
Thanks to Jeff S. for the tip!
Lisa Wade, PhD is an Associate Professor at Tulane University. She is the author of American Hookup, a book about college sexual culture; a textbook about gender; and a forthcoming introductory text: Terrible Magnificent Sociology. You can follow her on Twitter and Instagram.
Comments 16
The_L1985 — December 1, 2013
I'd never really paid attention to that. It only occurred to me this year that there's something really screwy about the mostly-Pilgrim Thanksgiving imagery.
It's even worse in the old Charlie Brown Thanksgiving special (not "It's Thanksgiving, Charlie Brown!" but the other one that tells the history). The special tells you that there were 53 British colonists and 90 natives at the first Thanksgiving. But it shows you several tables of white people and maybe 4 or 5 Indians. They can't even make the cartoon match with its own narration! (That said, the Peanuts version of Native-speak isn't nearly as bad as other portrayals of Indians from the same time period. They also pointed out that disease wiped out all of Squanto's nation except for the man himself.)
Another weird problem is that they ignore that all of the English people who died during that first winter at Plymouth were adults; all 30 of the children (where "children" includes infants through age 15) in Plymouth survived. So that means there were 4 women, 19 men, and 30 children of varying ages--more minors than adults! But you won't see THAT in any modern portrayals of the first Thanksgiving, either (although, again, the Peanuts special is a bit better about it than most others).
Bill R — December 1, 2013
2 comments:
1. I believe its extremely rare to see a multicultural party gathering in America anywhere outside NYC or SanFran, let alone at such a critical event as Thanksgiving Dinner... You guys see that? On college campuses? Or are cultures separated...almost all the time?
2. I am as decent and willing a cook as my 60-hour work-weeks allow, but am ritually KICKED OUT of the kitchen for Thanksgiving with regard to any critical-path activities. And that's with stern looks by my mother (82), wife (57) and daughter (25). "GET OUTA HERE!" These 3 can get nasty I'm telling ya. My ORDERS are to cut the veggies for crudités, bartend for the entire party (usually 12-15 people and we've done this event for 25 years straight), keep the family room stocked with munchies and hootch, "do the squash" (a 2-hour labor of love as I do this), sauté the Brussels sprouts, set the table, carve the bird, help clean up, stop my brother-in-law from turning the affair into a football party, and take out the garbage. I am freaking exhausted at the end of goddam affair so don't give this crap about "women cooking". And don't get me wrong; at least I don't have to drive!
Anyway, enjoy the holidays! (And give your old man some credit...)
Greg392 — December 1, 2013
Those natives are also wearing very stereotypical headdresses, which a quick Google search suggests are not very much like what the Wampanoag wore.
Asmodeus Belial — December 3, 2013
Professor Wade, you must go through life angry a lot.
beholdconfusion — December 7, 2013
While a 50/50 split of women and men depicted in the commercial may have been skewed compared to the actual numbers of women and men in the colony at the time, it hardly seems like half female is the same as "heavily" female. "Heavily" female makes it sound like it is all out of whack for even an ordinary dinner, but half female seems the exact opposite of a heavy bias in any one direction.
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