Due to stereotypes and gender scripts, women have always been depicted as the ones to be doing the housework. While the men were out working, women were to care for the children and upkeep the house. I wanted to look at what tactics TV advertisements use to encourage women to buy their products and why.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XiwcIiO0R4g
First example is a Mr.Clean commercial from 1963. “Listen Mister, I know a little more about floor cleaning than you do.” This line reinforces the stereotype that cleaning floors and housework in general is women’s work. Men are portrayed as clueless about cleaning normally. Women are routinely shown anguishing over dirty floors only to be relieved of their distress when Mr. Clean shows up to tell them how to keep their homes spotless. Even when commercials are aimed at women’s products, up to 90% of the time a man’s voice is used to explain the value of what is being sold using male voice-overs. This reinforces the cultural view that men are authorities and women are incompetent.
This commercial for Parozone uses a male to try to sell the cleaning products rather than a woman. The “going into battle” approach is a masculine way to sell products intended for mostly females. Masculine adjectives, such as touch and powerful, and verbs, such as destroy and kill, are used to describe the cleaning products. This style of selling aims at attempting to make cleaning a manlier task rather than women’s work.
People don't realize how much things like commercials actually impact our thoughts and actions. I was explaining this article to my dad and he argued with me that it didn't matter and there have always been men in commercials. He wasn't understanding that men doing housework is a big step in our society.. but even a bigger step being on TV. In our house, the housework has always been split so to my dad, its typical. He was a single dad for a few years, so he had no choice but to do the housework seeing as I was a baby. I think that by putting men in a "womens" role in the media is going to create a huge impact on future generations.
ReplyDeleteMy brother who is 7 is learning how to do the dishes, and I think it's great that my mom and step-dad are encouraging that. I'm hoping this will continue and there will not be the "divide" between me and women in the home.