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.

Via Slate.

In this video, Campbell Brown analyzesGov. Ed Rendell’s comments, overheard due to standing too close to an open mic, that Janet Napolitano is perfect for secretary of Homeland Security because she has no family (you can also see the video here if the CNN site doesn’t play correctly).

In fact, the wage gap between men and women is made up, almost entirely, by the comparison between men (fathers or not) and mothers. Women without children make significantly more money than mothers. Conversely, fathers make slightly more than men without children.

Women without children do pretty well at work in the U.S. Of course, about 90% of adult women are mothers.

Kay W. sent us a link to an archive of cigarette advertising and other historical materials.  Among the many interesting things there were some internal documents circulated by tobacco companies. I include some below:

Product placement contract:

Targeting youth:

Script for Frank Sinatra:

Directing scientific research:

Kona Grill specializes in “imaginative meals.”  In their ad campaign (discovered here), they sexualize their mixing of usually segregated culinary traditions (“East meets West”).  Here they put a fork and chopsticks in bed together:

Their food, apparently, is like interracial sex.  This is interesting in itself, but the copy goes further.  It reads:

A restuarant.  A bar.  A place where opposites attract.  Visit konagrill.com for a little taste.

So not only are East and West (or Asians and Americans) different, they’re “opposites.”  Such advertising not only fetishizes interracial relationships, but it reinforces the idea that race and culture are such powerful and defining characteristics that people from the East and the West could not possibly have anything in common (except sex, of course).

I’ve never been able to find a picture of it, but when I was in graduate school (not so long ago) and living in Madison, Wisconsin, there was an ad for Bacardi on the side of a city bus that said: “Bacardi, the Ultimate Wingman.”  A wingman is a friend who helps you get laid, so the not-so-subtle message of the ad was: “get’er drunk and she’ll do ya!”

Here are two ads that have, essentially, the same message (the first was given to me by my student, Bo; the second was found here).

This one could be interpreted as, “Drink Heineken so you won’t be nervous,” or, “Drink Heineken so you’ll get what you want without any trouble.”

In this ad for Bud Light, with the copy “Endless Opportunities,” the man and the viewer of the ad exchange a conspiratorial gaze, while the woman glances to the side or, perhaps, back at him.  Is the message, “If I’m drinking Bud Light, anything could happen,” or “If she’s drinking Bud Light, anything could happen”?

See also this ad for, ostensibly, a date rape drug.

An anonymous commenter pointed us to billboard below advertising Southern Comfort as a “liquid panty remover.”  Before we get our panties in a bunch, I should point out it’s a hoax (thanks, Vidya):

So this is a hoax.  It still trivializes trying to manipulate women by getting them drunk (at best) and date rape (at worst), but it could have been produced by any yahoo with a computer.  Yahoos with computers can do anything they like, I’d be more concerned if it was circulated by the company that markets Southern Comfort.

That said, in looking it up to discover it was a hoax, I discovered about a dozen recipes for mixed drinks called “Liquid Panty Remover.”  Here are some screen shots:

So I guess there was good news and bad news.

NEW! In this ad, sent in by HighJive of MultiCultClassics, the brandy is the “producer.”  The producer is the person who makes a film happen.  Thus the sexy scene that is about to ensue is attributed to the alcohol.  (Also notice the linking of the product with pornography.)

Also in sexualizing alcohol: “nice cans,” “she loves a cockatoo,” sexy robots (see here and here), “aged longer, tastes smoother,” and, um, this one.

Hello Readers!  We enriched some posts this month.  Enjoy!

Ed L. sent us another good example of the way that a cultural understanding that marriage as about love, a relatively new idea in human history, can be used to normalize gay marriage by pointing out that men and men and women and women can love each other deeply.  Click here and scroll down for the commercial.

What is racist?  We added a second confession to one we posted earlier.

Our post on anachronistic portrayals of American Indians was cross-posted at Racialicious.   One of the commenters pointed us to some additional material that we’ve used to update the post on anachronism and an older post on American Indian mascots.  Scroll down.

We found another vintage ad using the “savage” to sell.  Check it out here.

We added a vintage Union-Castle cruise ad to this post of a colonial-era travel poster for Hong Kong. The Castle ad portrays Africans and their houses as a tourist attraction for Whites to enjoy.

We added two Swiffer ads and a link to Swiffer’s “break-up channel” to this post about cleaning products being portrayed as women’s “special friends.”

You may remember a recent post about how the new Risk boardgame has been re-fashioned to be, well, blatantly for guys only. Well, Julie C. went to the website and played the online game which is not about world domination, but in fact about banging hot chicks and other ways to prove you’re a manly man. It’s pretty remarkable. Enjoy! (Scroll down past the original post.)

There was a time in American history when women agonized about being too skinny.  Check out the two ads for products that will help women put on weight that we added to two others in a previous post.

We came across another example of an ad, this one from 1934, urging women to start shaving their armpits.  We added it to another, along with our discussion of the marketing effort that made armpit shaving a norm for women and a money-making endeavor for some.  Relatedly, we added some more vintage ads for douche and feminine deodorant, sent in by Ben O., to this post about douche ads.

In a comments thread, Tim pointed us to another product shaped by a boob.  We added it to our extensive post on products shaped like boobs.