What a Collection of Pictures Reveals Vis-à-vis What Is Portrayed
Sarah Asch
This year's December issue of Jane, a shopping magazine for women launched in 1997, entitled
"Shocked but not Surprised," is a magazine targeted specifically at the female
consumer. Jane is a magazine
comprised fully of editorials and advertisements that serve to offer its audience
a set or model of what is to be consumed from clothes to accessories to bikini
trimmers thereby revealing how its contents can be said to play a crucial
role in instructing the [female] body in how to enact gender, whether it be
with the clothes they wear or the way they act in social situations. The fact
that women consume such a magazine shows that they can, or want to, identify, or
at least align themselves, with Jane's contents,
whether it be the need to accessorize or the desire to shave the pubic area.
These advertisements, which promote alcoholic beverages Captain Morgan rum
and Jose Cuervo tequila, I will argue reflect gender ideologies and practices
linked to and influenced by cultural ideologies that are ultimately dictated
by the more powerful actor. Through an examination of these ads I will emphasize
that women by consuming and reproducing the actions that are portrayed to
them in ad campaigns they are therefore accepting the stereotypes that are
conveyed in them thereby perpetuating the legitimacy of the power structures
that create and promote such stereotypes in the first place.
It is important to understand how our attention as both audience and consumer
is being directed and to what end in both A (Captain
Morgan ad) and B (Jose Cuervo ad). I will now explore the ways in which
the audience's attention is directed within each advertisement. This will
serve as a background that will enlighten my discussion about the advertisements
subversive nature in following sections:
A Since the scene is in black and
white, our attention is drawn by all that is red in this advertisement thereby
honing our focus on to that which it highlights, specifically the two women
on whom there are red Captain-esque mustaches. Because of this the audience
is forced to see these women as the subject of, and thus the actors in, the
scene. The other colored image in this advertisement is the Captain Morgan
icon in the top right corner whose stare is directed at the women further
highlighting their role as subject in the ad while at the same time subtly
drawing our attention to the two men placed directly underneath it. The final
colored image in the ad are the two texts reading "The Captain was here" at
the bottom of the scene which again serves to highlight the women as a result
of their mustaches, and "Combo in the corner" placed above the women but next
to the Captain icon. Because of the former's placement, the audience is not
only confirmed that the two women are the focus, subjects, and thus the actors
in the advertisement but with the second text the audience can imply that
they too have agency in the scenario in which they are framed. The importance
of these texts in light of the subversive role of the men in the ad will be
revealed later when I explore a different interpretation of the ad in order
to reveal certain stereotypes that this ad confirms in terms of gender roles
and gendered action.
B This scene is also in black and
white with color used to highlight the text. The three women are placed in
between numerous rows of bottles of alcohol leading us to assume that not
only have been drinking but that they are probably drunk. Two of these women
are seated atop two men and all three are engaged in conversation apparently
unawares of the men on which they are seated. The audience is meant to focus
on the women since not only are they at the top of the ad which it lighter
in tone, but that the rows of bottles at either side of the group direct our
eye to them. The text across the bottom reads "It Watches Your Back" all in
capitals with an asterik leading us to a smaller line of capitals reading
"Not True, Only Your Friends Can Do That." This text along with the audiences
directed presumptions about the subject of the ad allow the audience to believe
that women here are empowered, have agency, and are in control.
Both advertisements call upon feminist struggles for agency and power for
women by employing the rhetoric of choice in order to reach the target audience,
which in the context of its presence in Jane
can be assumed to be women as previously noted. This mode of speech is intended
to empower the targeted audience by reinforcing their sense of power of, and
in, choice. Now to look at the rhetoric of choice in its specific contexts:
A The Captain Morgan's ad reads "Combo
in the Corner?" in red across the top of a black and white scene in which
two women in the foreground are playing a game of pool under the observation
of two men in the background. Because of the red mustaches on their upper
lips, if we are to read the ad in light of its feminist allusions, it is more
than likely that the audience is to assume that this suggestion is thought
by the women about the men rather than a shot in the game of pool. Because
of the sly communicative look on the left-most woman's face paired with the
slight pointing of her pinky finger to the men the audience can infer a sense
of her agency and power in her ability to exercise choice and also generalize
this state of empowerment to her friend who can be assumed to share her friend's
suggestion that their feminine duo parley with the duo of men across the room.
B The text of this advertisement
targets a woman's choice and her agency in a situation on another front. This
ad reminds women what they have been reminded of time and time again once
they gain independence, by this I mean once they gain the right to exercise
choice. It reminds them to be cautious while at the same time reinforcing
the sentiment that women need to work with and for each other, both reminiscent
too of feminist sentiments. This aspect of the ad targets women's empowerment
through their cohesiveness, one that is apparent in their disregard for the
men upon whom they are perched. Their ignorance of the men can either be interpreted
as powerful avoidance or naïve interaction. I will explicate the latter in
the following section showing that it is in the subversive, opposing side
of the two-fold interpretation of ads that models of stereotypical gender
behavior are conveyed.
The empowering components in both advertisements that serve to place the
audience's focus on the women as agents and thus apparently give them empowerment
can actually be subversive to female agency as they distract the audience
form the dominating actions and roles of the men. It is in this final section
that I will explore how the advertisements may actually be counter and harmful
to female claims to empowerment as they reinforce demonstrations of gender
by showing this contingent upon those that determine its acceptability.
A The two females in this scene,
although seemingly empowered, are not the subjects of the scene in the sense
that they are the subjects of the audience's eye if we are to take the use
of subliminality to be the dominant tool in advertising. The women here are
the subject of the men's observation and are thus too the subject for the
consumer framed through the eyes of the men. It is in this way that the advertisement
promotes women as objects whose empowered role as subject exists in (as it
is determined by) males. It is through the qualities of the advertisement
discussed above in light of male subliminality, namely with regards to the
text narrating the scene from atop, that the widely understood male fantasy
of [sexually] aggressive and/or dominant women is portrayed in this ad.
B The placement, expressions, and
actions of the men in this ad are reminiscent of the "little red riding hood"
story. The women, in their empowering unit, appear to feel unharmed by the
men precariously placed in the scene. Although the men are literally watching
(more like peering at) the backs of the women in the group above them they
do not appear to be the sort of friends to which the text is referring. Because
the text of this ad, as discussed before, taps on feminist allusions it frames
the men as predators threatening that cohesiveness and power of the group.
It is in this way that this advertisement evokes the male fantasy to domineer
and possibly take advantage of innocent, trusting women further accounting
for the text instructing that women need to watch out for each other. If we
are to interpret these women to be innocent and trusting we can also assume
that they would require the guidance of other women to tell them what to do.
This last inference can also evoke the male stereotype of women as fickle
and easily persuaded. Thus, when viewing this ad in light of its male subliminality,
it is easy to see that female empowerment and independence is contingent upon
male capacity to respect that space.
While the context in which an advertisement appears shapes interpretations
made by its audience context can also blind what is at work beyond the surface.
Both advertisements reveal two main camps in stereotypes of women beneath
the rhetoric of women's choice. Advertisement A speaks to the stereotype that women are sexually aggressive
while B conveys the stereotype
that women are innocent, trusting, and fickle beings. Both invocations can
be employed to the advantage of male desires not only to see women as sexy
but engage with them in a sexual way thereby acknowledging and thus reinforcing
power structures of male dominance based in sexual relations. The particular
performances of womanhood apparent in these advertisements reinforce static
culture norms ascribing gender identity, or roles, to agent-less individuals.
The problem is that gender identities, meanings, and representations are fluid,
shifting, historically and contextually relevant produced by both actors and
non-actors alike. Assumptions about gender behavior propelled by advertisements
allow individuals to overlook reality and further gender stereotypes. Women
and men are products of, but not reducible to, the structures around them.
While individual actors have agency, they cannot act completely independent
of their social surroundings. In order to stop cultural, structural, and representational
conflict promoted in popular culture constructions of womanhood, or manhood,
evoked in advertisements such issues must be recognized and examined, not
to be ignored for the sake of aesthetics or production value.