Welcome to Christmas 2008!

Rose McM. sent us this great example of rigidly gender-coded toys from the Sears Wish Catalog (click to enlarge):

NEW! (Jan. ’10): Sarah O. snapped this photo of toys that teach girls they should cook and care for babies, while boys can build things and be doctors:

See also these posts on the Rose Petal Cottage and Tonka Trucks (“built for boyhood!”).

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.

I found this Absolut Vodka ad in Entertainment Weekly:

It draws on that whole Men Are from Mars, Women Are from Venus ideology in which men and women are so different we can barely understand each other without expert help.

UPDATE: Commenter ihdl pointed out this German dictionary, titled Woman-German, German-Woman: Quick Help for the Clueless Man:

And Emberiza noted that a Man-German, German-Man is available as well:

Thanks for pointing them out!

The 1966 and 1976 editions of this old board game illustrate both historical ideas about gender and the way they can change in just ten years.

The 1966 version for girls (found here):

Options for girls include going to charm school to become a model, nursing school to become a nurse, drama school to become an actress, college to become a teacher, ballet school to become a ballet dancer, or airline training school to become an airline hostess.

The 1966 version for boys (found here):

Options for boys include going to law school to become a statesman, graduate school to become a scientist, medical school to become a doctor, college to become an athlete (!?), technical school to become an engineer, or flight school to become an astronaut.

They revised the girl’s game (I’m not sure about the boy’s game) in 1976 (found here).  Girls could now choose between going to medical school to become a surgeon, the riding academy to be a jockey, flight training school to be an astronaut, college to be a commentator, drama school to be a director, and law school to be a lawyer.

I wonder if the revised boy’s version included going to college to become an elementary school teacher, to medical school to be a pediatrician, or to a dance academy to become a dancer.  I predict not.

From 1987 (found here):

No date (found here):

Also in “Oriental” stereotypes: a new restaurant in Rhode Island and Oriental Pearl Cream.

Thus far in this series I have offered five explanations of why people of color are included in advertising: (1) to associate the product with a racial stereotype, (2) give a product “color” or “flavor,” (3) invoke ideas of “hipness” or “modernity,” (4) trigger the idea of human variation itself, or (5) suggest that the company cares about racial equality.

With this post, I begin illustrating how they are included. Here I show that, in many cases, people of color are included, but they are made to blend in with whiteness such that they vary only by the color of their skin.  This is related to two things (at least).

First, beauty is racialized such that what makes some darker-skinned women distinctive from some lighter-skinned women ( e.g., hair texture, nose shape, skin color) also makes them less beautiful according to mainstream cultural standards in the U.S.  When women of color are included in advertising, then, they often look very similar to the White women they are with, varying only by a few degrees (eg., straightened hair [sometimes lightened], slightly darker skin, slightly wider nose).  Check out these terrific examples.

Second, when women of color don’t conform to white standards of beauty, it is often interpreted as resistance to assimilation to whiteness and, thus, threatening.  For example, when The New Yorker wanted to parody the rumor that the Obamas were Muslim terrorists, they put an afro on Michelle.  So an advertiser will often choose women of color who look more-or-less white because to do otherwise is to send a message of non-conformity or resistance.  This is often done strategically, but if they don’t want to send this message, they will include a woman of color who look assimilated.

Here are some examples:

Next up: Chaperoning.

Also in this series:
(1) Including people of color so as to associate the product with the racial stereotype.
(2) Including people of color to invoke (literally) the idea of “color” or “flavor.”
(3) To suggest ideas like “hipness,” “modernity,” and “progress.”
(4) To trigger the idea of human diversity.
(5) To suggest that the company cares about diversity.

Here are a couple of pictures that morph the faces of President-Elect Obama and Abraham Lincoln. By now, I doubt people haven’t either seen or imagined such images; the comparison is pretty popular in the media. Indeed, as Time columnist Joe Klein says in this article, Obama “has never been shy about comparing himself to Abraham Lincoln.” The more obvious reasons for such comparisons have to do with his platform of change, negotiation, and most notably, his appointment of “a team of rivals” to high cabinet positions (a notion that, given the very different contexts of their presidencies, holds less water than it should– for instance, Obama is not hurtling toward a civil war).

But another less examined consequence of this type of morphing is that images like these can also unintentionally work as a strategy to produce an essentialized vision of President Obama as untouchable. Perhaps in the end, the more that we (the public) buy into this morphing of the two presidents into one, the less apt we — Democrats, or even Republicans for that matter– are to either criticize or engage in serious policy discussions and debates. In a sense, such comparisons could potentially allow President-Elect Obama to squelch, change, or appropriate differing viewpoints within his own party, and visual representation through the various morphings of Obama-Lincoln we find on the internet and in print– and the instant association we make between the two– could very well keep the American public from seriously disagreeing with his “core vision,” whether from the left or the right.

Sandra F. sent in a link to “Prop 8: The Musical,” a parody starring Jack Black, Margaret Cho, Andy Richter, John C. Reilly, Neil Patrick Harris, and other celebrities:

The clip, though a parody, brings up a reason some groups that might not care about the reasons gays and lesbians want to get married, or about gay rights more broadly, nonetheless supported gay marriage: money. The New York Times discussed this issue here. Weddings are big business, and the more people who are eligible to be married, the more money is potentially available to wedding-related businesses. In 2004, the Congressional Budget Office estimated the impact legalizing same-sex marriage would have on the budget (end result: an estimated $1 billion a year for the 10-year estimation period). That’s just the federal budgetary effect; it doesn’t include private-sector benefits.

This anti-Prop 8 video makes an explicitly economic argument for gay marriage:

You might compare these videos to the commercials in this post; in those ads, advocates of gay marriage try to rhetorically frame the issue as being about love–that is, gay marriages are equated with straight marriages by focusing on the idea that what is important in a marriage is love, regardless of the sex of the spouses. Clearly you could use them to discuss gay marriage, but they might also be good for illustrating the idea of framing of social issues.

Thanks, Sandra!

We’re talking about the medicalization of pregnancy and the natural childbirth and breastfeeding movements in my Women’s Studies class, so here are some data on rates of breastfeeding in the U.S., which you might use for a discussion of ideals of motherhood, medicalization, and the difficulties of integrating breastfeeding with full-time work. The regional patterns are also fascinating.

This map shows the percent of children born in 2005 ever breastfed at all (including those supplemented with formula):

This one shows the percent of children who were only breastfed (no formula supplementing) for the first three months:

And here we have the rates of exclusive breastfeeding up to 6 months. Notice how low the rates are, with many states having 10% or less of children breastfed exclusively for that long:

Here are overall rates:

And overall rates of kids ever breastfed, including with formula supplementing:

About 25% of babies are supplemented with formula within the first 48 hours:

Here’s a whole lot of information on rates of breastfeeding:

In general, higher incomes are associated with higher rates of breastfeeding, which probably partially explains some of the other patterns (regional, race, etc.). My guess is many people will attribute this to cultural factors–the idea that highly-educated women with higher incomes have access to more information about breastfeeding, are more aware of how important it is, and have more access to support systems that encourage breastfeeding. I suspect part of it is also that some women–particularly those with higher incomes–are more able to take time off work to stay home for at least a short while, making breastfeeding easier. Of course, the paradox there is that the very families who can least afford expensive formula are most likely to use it.

All images found at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s breastfeeding website.