Paper #2

Kayla DiRoma

Dr. Sonia Begert

English 101

3 August 2015

Gender Roles Textual Analysis

Gender roles have always been an ongoing and giant issue. “Men are from Mars and women are from Venus.” Obviously everyone knows that women and men are not from different planets, but it is said that the two genders are so entirely different in many ways that then they are from different planets. Women and men are both humans, they have a brain and a heart and they have hopes and dreams just alike. Women are seen in different ways in different cultures, their roles in the workforce, in the family and overall in the culture varies and it doesn’t help when companies big and small make the issue bigger by involving gender roles into their advertisements obviously by doing it for a reason. Feminists and even meninists are real and people have strong beliefs on how all genders should be treated, how they are treated and call to action when a gender is treated or seen in a way they personally do not agree with. Cleaning products, cooking utensils, home goods stores and beer are just a few advertisements that have been found to stereotype whether they are from last year or fifty years ago. The advertisements have a heavy appeal to ethos or trying to convince someone of character or credibility.

 Mr. Clean products released an advertisement that says “This Mother’s Day, Get Back To The Job That Really Matters.” While a little girl is pointing at a dirty spot on the window that the mother is cleaning. This advertisement is wanting people to buy the Mr. Clean Magic Eraser but it portrays a stereotypical role of women as being solely housewives. The woman on the ad has a cheerful smile on her face as she

is cleaning with the magic eraser, which makes it seem like she enjoys to clean and that is why she is smiling.  This advertisement is a persuasive appeal by using pathos to appeal to the audience’s sense of identity and self-interest. Mr. Clean appeals to a woman’s identity and self-interest by having a woman and her child in the ad and they are both cheerfully cleaning, it shouts out that women love to clean and even in the text Mr. Clean thinks that the “Job that really matters” for a woman is for her to clean. Going back to the words that is used to portray this cleaning product the ad is made essentially for Mother’s Day, a day for everyone in the house to even more than ever, remember to appreciate their mother, but Mr. Clean would rather point out that the only job that matters when looking at women is them being a housewife, i.e. cleaning and staying in the kitchen. This advertisement is intended for the audience of women, it shows a lady cleaning, is talking about mother’s day and says that the only job that matters for women is to clean.

An older advertisement that came out in 1961 was for a kitchen or cooking tool called a Kenwood Chef. This advertisement pins women as being housewives again, in big black letters the ad says “The Chef does everything but cook- that’s what wives are for!” The husband is being hugged from behind from the wife who is wearing a chef’s hat and they are smiling so happily with a Kenwood Chef sitting right in front of them. In the bottom corner the ad states “I’m giving my wife a Kenwood Chef.” When the word Kenwood is presented the K is huge and a man and wife are sitting on top of the letter arm in arm.  The ad targets married men and women, maybe the wife wants a break from cooking her husband meals all the time and

wanted a Kenwood Chef. The couple in the advertisement is white, and of course in this era being in the late 1950’s and early 1960’s, American culture was portrayed as being white and middle class with the husbands working hard and the wives staying home, cooking, cleaning, doing laundry, or just being a housewife. Kenwood’s slogan primarily calls out the duty of the women being in the kitchen, having it say cooking is what wives are for. The purpose of this text is to appeal to men and women to buy the kitchen appliance that has so many different functions to help with cooking tasks. The main focus of the picture is the Kenwood Chef appliance that contrasts with the couple’s attire of them both wearing all black and the appliance is all white. The background of the picture is bland and really has no color so the couple and the Kenwood Chef really stand out from the boring and dirty background. By convincing their audience of having wives to cook for their husbands the Kenwood Chef is successful for using the words and picture because back then white men and women would see the advertisement and appeal to it by also being white and having the woman doing everything around the house and having the man be the suit and tie man he is, and go to work and come home to a warm home cooked meal by his wife, or if you are lucky enough by the Kenwood Chef.  This ad is practically saying that the Kenwood Chef can do really anything.

An advertisement made in 1952 from Schlitz a brewing company based in Wisconsin also has a stereotype of men and women. Like the last advertisement I talked about this ad is even older but it still has to do with the stereotyping of not only men and women but also white and other races. In this ad, there is a man and his wife in the kitchen, the woman has a burning pot in her hands with scorching black smoke coming out of it and she is wiping her eyes from crying and feeling bad about burning her homemade dinner. The dinner table is set for two with two empty plates and empty glasses, but the only thing that is not empty on the table is a bright red plate with two Schlitz beers sitting on top of it proudly. In bold black text underneath the picture it reads “Anyway, you didn’t burn the Schlitz!” Which implies that the woman is upset and feels bad for burning the food but the husband lets it slide since, she didn’t end up burning the great American beer. In fine print under the bold print it writes “There’s hope for any young bride who knows her man well enough to serve him Schlitz Beer. For what man (or woman) can resist the taste of Schlitz Beer.” The reference to woman who cannot resist the taste of the beer either, is in parenthesis unlike the reference to the man which is not. This advertisement is calling out to men and also women, and in different ways. It calls to woman by saying that there is hope for any young bride, which is saying if you want your marriage to last then you need to make sure to get your man Schlitz Beer. The ad is directed to men because the men are not in the parenthesis like the woman are, because “what man (or woman) can resist the taste of Schlitz Beer.” By doing this is shows that women are not of equal status than men. When the ad states there is having hope for a young bride to ‘serve’ her husband Schlitz Beer it then again brings woman down to a different level than men. Schlitz uses logos in a way also, they state “A taste millions prefer to the taste over any other beer. No, we’re not just saying that. Here’s the simple proof: Schlitz tastes so good to so many people it’s first in sales in the U.S.A.” They use their own statistic of saying that it is the first in sales over any other beer so just saying that, you have to buy it. Schlitz is also the “Beer that made Milwaukee famous.”

Sexism is an ongoing issue that will probably never go away, without the help of big brand companies maybe gender roles wouldn’t be as big as it is. Advertisements use the help of calling out one gender to appeal to their audience and help themselves get more views and products sold, they use ethos and try to convince people of a certain gender and character. Famous people even add to the trouble by calling themselves feminists and there is a trending twitter page of one million followers titled “meninists” which sells shirts and adds posts about whatever they feel like including posts about men being better than women, people take sexism as a joke and some don’t but whatever side they are on they are still adding on to the issue.