The Interplay between Advertising and Society: An Historical Analysis

Racial Reflections in Advertising

The United States was founded primarily by white settlers from Europe. The US Constitution had to be amended to abolish slavery in 1865, again in 1868 to grant citizenship to former slaves, and in 1870 to protect former slaves’ right to vote. Despite these 19th century amendments to the Constitution, there were numerous civil rights and voting rights laws passed in the middle part of the 20th Century because minorities, African Americans in particular, were overtly and covertly being discriminated against in employment, housing, education, public accommodations (services), and voting. This discrimination was often violent. The deep-seated hatred even resulted in a large number of deaths by lynching and other murders.

In a post-civil war society, debates were waged in everyday conversation and in the House and Senate about the rights of former slaves. As the country faced demographic and socio-cultural change, societal values and norms adjusted as laws changed in the U.S. Advertisers influenced society by using long-held stereotypes, depicting African Americans as servants in advertisements for many years as witnessed in an 1889 Aunt Jemima advertisement and Shenely’s Cream of Kentucky Bourbon where a black man is serving a white man in a 1940’s advertisement (see Figure 2). African Americans were still depicted in slave-like settings in advertisements nearly 75 years after the Civil War. A 1939 Monsanto advertisement depicted African Americas picking cotton in a field with a tagline stating that they workers were serving mankind.

OPEN IN VIEWER

Figure 2.

Image of Schenley’s advertisement.

The Civil Rights Movement was responsible for highlighting discrimination at lunch counters, on city busses, and many other places in American society. In 1955, more than a decade after Jackie Robinson was court marshalled for refusing to sit in the back of a segregated Army bus, Rosa Parks created a national stir by refusing to sit in the back of a Montgomery, Alabama bus in the “colored section.” A 1960 sit-in at a Woolworth’s lunch counter by four African American students in North Carolina highlighted discrimination in the service sector. During a 1963 march for jobs on Washington, DC, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. delivered his famous “I Have a Dream Speech” before a quarter of a million supporters in front of the Lincoln Memorial. In response to voting obstruction, a march of more than 50 miles from Montgomery to Selma, Alabama, took place in 1965 to show that African Americans were still not allowed to exercise their right to vote despite civil rights laws. In 2020, charges of voter suppression have been made in at least one Southern state.

Televised beatings of peaceful protesters, and film of police turning high-pressure fire hoses on the demonstrators and letting vicious police dogs attack them, along with extensive publicity of Southern lynching’s and murders, made many Americans question the deeply held values of racial discrimination. One of the most famous leaders of the Civil Rights Movement, Dr. King, was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1964 for his peaceful methods of highlighting social injustice in the U.S.

During these critical years of social-cultural and demographic change, the depiction of African Americans in advertising began to change. Societal changes and values influenced how the advertiser depicted black people. In 1948, seven years after the very first television commercial, Jax Beer aired the first television commercial featuring African American actors. Lever Brothers’ 1963 Wisk laundry detergent television commercial was the first integrated commercial featuring two boys playing baseball (AdAge 2003; Watson 1994). Following was a commercial for another Lever Brothers’ detergent, All, that featured famous television host Art Linkletter interviewing an African American homemaker about her laundry problems (Watson 1994).

However, the use of African American actors in commercials was sparse for several more years. One of the first African American celebrities to become a brand spokesperson was comedian Bill Cosby in the mid-1960s, due to his fame from starring in the television show I Spy, first for White Owl Cigars and then for Coca Cola. In the 1970s, he became the spokesman for Jell-O in what was to become a long and successful campaign. Beyond celebrities, it was years before African American actors were commonly found in US television commercials. Many of the early commercials featured exclusively African American casts rather than integrated casts, presumably because the ads were targeted at that market segment. This can be seen in ads for some fast-food restaurants in the late 1990s for example. One notable exception, Coca Cola’s 1971 Hilltop (“I’d Like to Buy the World a Coke”) commercial gained notoriety in part for its uniquely diverse cast of singers from around the world.

American society has been racially segregated for most of the country’s history. Whites lived in both rural and urban areas, in all geographic regions while African Americans were initially concentrated in the agrarian South, an artifact of the Country’s history of slavery. Before the 20th Century, more than 90% of African Americans lived in the South, primarily in rural areas. In what has become known as the Great Northern Migration (1910-1970), many African Americans moved to urban centers in the Northeast, Midwest, and West, seeking industrial jobs in the newly created automobile plants, steel mills, meatpacking plants, shipyards, and railroads (Tolnay 2003). By the end, only half of African Americans lived in the South, and the vast majority, over 80% of all African Americans lived in cities (The New York Public Library 2005).

During the 20th Century, particularly the latter half, and the first two decades of the 21st Century, dramatic changes occurred in American demography. Increases in income, education, and urbanization among all races have had other impacts. One is a dramatic increase in relationships among people of different races, including both personal and romantic relationships. In 2015, 17% of all newlyweds had a spouse of a different race or ethnicity (Livingston and Brown 2017). The U.S. Census questionnaire now recognizes that many Americans are multiracial (United States Census 2020). Discrimination in employment is now illegal, which increased interaction among races and ethnicities in the workplace. Redlining in housing and discrimination in leasing and home sales is also illegal, leading to integrated neighborhoods and schools.

One of the most profound areas of impact on society is education. Not only does an increase in educational level create more opportunities for members of the society, but it can also lead to enlightenment among the majority so that they are more accepting of their fellows. Brown v. Board of Education (1998) was a major step toward creating educational opportunities for non-white American children by prohibiting school segregation. Although the U.S. Supreme Court voted unanimously in this case, many states resisted the ruling, and the Federal Government had to enforce integration of schools. In fact, President Eisenhower sent the U.S. Army to escort nine children into Little Rock Central High School in 1957

Eventually, with access to better schools and access to college, the number of African Americans with a Bachelor’s degree or higher increased at a faster pace than other races: from 1% in 1940 to 24% in 2017, versus 5% and 34% for other races (Black Demographics 2020). The changes in society were reflected in advertising. In 1963 the New York Telephone company depicted a black man as a professional, perhaps to influence society. Society also influenced advertisers in the 1960s as evidenced by the boycott of Frito-Lay because of the Frito Bandito advertisement that promoted historical stereotypes.

One of the most evident expressions of American culture is professional sport. Many of these sports were initially restricted to white contestants only. With the exception of boxing, where Jack Johnson became the first African American world heavyweight champion in 1908, most professional sports were not integrated until the middle of the Twentieth Century or later. The first African American player was signed in the National Football League in 1946 and in major league baseball the following year. The National Basketball Association was integrated in 1947 but had no African American players until 1950.

The emergence of African American athletes in other sports was equally slow. In tennis, for example, Althea Gibson was the first African American to win a Grand Slam event in 1956. A decade later, Arthur Ashe emerged as a premier player on the men’s circuit. In golf, Charlie Sifford was the first African American to earn a PGA tour card in 1961, the year that the PGA removed its Caucasians-only clause. During the mid-1970s, Hertz Rent-A-Car hired football player O.J. Simpson to appear in their ads, running through airports and using his famous football skills to avoid crashing into other passengers on his way to the rental car counter. Tiger Woods’ dominance of the Tour began when he turned pro in 1996. Woods, who is mixed race, was the butt of a racial joke by another player after winning the Masters for the first time. The joke was based on his African American heritage, not his Asian American heritage. Early in his career Woods was used in advertisements to promote AT&T, Gatorade, General Motors, and Nike. But after several personal transgressions, advertisers feared the risk of alienating consumers and other stakeholders and responded by dropping him from their advertisements.

Art transcends culture. One of the most powerful art forms for integrating the U.S. has been music. From jazz to blues to rockabilly and rock and roll, color lines were blurred beginning more than a century ago. Music helped integrate commercials. Coca Cola’s Hilltop commercial was one such ad and may be an early example of an advertiser trying to influence society’s values. In 1984 Pepsi introduced the “Thriller” with Michael Jackson featuring the next generation of Pepsi drinkers, a mix of white and black children were used in the advertisements reflecting changes in societal values and norms.

Perhaps parallel to the integration of advertising was the integration of television itself. Amos ‘n’ Andy, a television comedy adaptation of a popular radio show performed by white actors, appeared in 1951 on CBS featuring mostly black actors, but in caricature performances that were the subject of protests by the NAACP. I Spy was the first television drama to co-star an African American actor, Bill Cosby in 1965. In 1968, Diahann Carroll starred in the title role as a nurse in the television sitcom, Julia. A year later, Room 222, a drama set in a multiracial high school featured an integrated cast. During this time, there were several television shows that featured African American actors in regular supporting roles, including Hogan’s Heroes (1965), Star Trek (1966), and Mission Impossible (1966). Despite the integration of the shows on television, the actors in the commercials that supported the shows tended to be mostly white.

Movies were also slow to integrate. Early Hollywood films featured African Americans in subservient roles such as porters or servants. Asian American actors were rarely used. In fact, the title role in the famous Charlie Chan detective movies was played by a white actor. Hispanic American actors found an easier time integrating into Hollywood, but often stereotyped. In the early 1970s, a series of films were produced featuring nearly all African American casts including Shaft, Superfly, and Coffy. These became known as the Blaxploitation genre because of the disproportionate number of stereotypes portrayed. Marketers targeted blacks in specialized media. In 1972, Ebony ran an advertisement for Kodak depicting a black Santa Claus. In mainstream media Proctor & Gamble launched a 2006 campaign entitled My Black is Beautiful.

While the U.S. is known and the melting pot, many immigrants find it difficult to assimilate into society. Cultural, religious, language, and racial differences can inhibit the ability of newcomers to blend into their new society. These factors can also make incumbents resistant to accept their new fellow citizens. Opportunities for business, social and romantic relationships are initially very limited and only increase with the passage of time and changes in attitudes. In fact, this resistance to many interracial relationships was institutionalized as it was illegal in many states for people of different races to marry. The 1967 Supreme Court case, Loving v. Virginia, made it legal for people of different races to marry anywhere in the United States. Later ads, particularly in the last decade, commercials commonly show friends of different races and even interracial couples and families. The interplay between advertising and society continued as Barack Obama became President in 2008 and the Black Lives Matter movement emerged in 2013. As society values and norms changed, advertisers began reflecting this in advertising. In 2012 Starbucks ran an advertisement with a mixed-race couple. In the next year Cheerios depicted a mixed-race family that received a negative response, but Cheerios acted in an enlightened manner and ran the ad during the 2014 Super Bowl. Mixed race families are depicted in advertisements from fashion (Calvin Klein) to mundane products (Tide).

Our analysis finds that initially advertising portrayed stereotypical images of African Americans. Over time, changes in social roles, values and norms gave rise to legal and political change. Society influenced the portrayal of race in advertising and advertising played a role in society’s changes. The depiction of blacks in advertising is reflective of major changes in society. While these changes are positive there is still much work to be done in terms of equality in the U.S.

LGBTQ Reflections in Advertising

A recent poll estimates that 4.5% of the U.S. population is LGBT (Newport 2018), 3.9% of men and 5.1% of women. They tend to be younger, a higher percentage of Millennials vs Gen X’ers or Baby Boomers, and they tend to be lower income. UCLA School of Law’s Williams Institute found that 58% of LGBT Americans were female, 58% White, 21% Latino, and 12% Black, 1% Asian and 5% mixed race (The Williams Institute 2019). Reportedly, 33% are raising children. The study found a higher instance of unemployment, uninsured, food insecurity, and low income (less than $24,000/year) among LGBTQ Americans than non-LGBTQ. Interestingly, same-sex couples tend to have higher incomes than heterosexual couples ($56,000 vs. $46,000) and are more likely to be college educated (51% vs. 34%). The buying power of the LGTBQ population is estimated to be $917 billion (Clarke 2019). Members of this community support companies that market to the LGTBQ community. Furthermore, more than 60% of women state that they are more likely to recall and to buy a brand that is LGTBQ friendly (Clarke 2019). By recognizing and marketing to this segment of society, advertisers can risk alienating some other groups in society. The major events in the fight for LGBTQ rights are detailed in Table 3.

The LGBTQ population long faced “morality laws,” social stigmas, accompanied by hatred and discrimination, often accompanied by distorted religious messages. In New York City, in the summer of 1969, the community resisted a police raid in what has become known as the Stonewall Riots. Each year, LGBTQ individuals and allies commemorate this event with various “pride” events, including parades, marches, and festivals around the world. Absolut Vodka has linked their product to Stonewall and to date has spent over $31 million on LGBTQ marketing (Stiffler, 2020). Absolut has focused on sending a message of solidarity, in 2000 they ran “Absolut GLAAD” praising the organization. In 2008, in an ad entitled “AbsolutWorld” a man asked another man to marry him at a baseball game while the message implied fan approval. Additionally, in 2009 Absolut advertised a rainbow bottle to recognize decades of gay pride and the 40th anniversary of the Stonewall rights (Singh 2017). Absolut does more than market to the LGBTQ community they state, “that outreach, engagement, and support is an ongoing commitment that lasts well beyond June Pride Month,” states Absolut Vice President Regan Clarke, who cites the Absolut Pride Bottle as an example. Once designed in partnership with the late Gilbert Baker (the Pride flag designer), the Pride bottle (see Figure 3), Clarke notes, “now has nationwide, yearlong distribution (Stiffler, 2020).”

OPEN IN VIEWER

Figure 3.

Absolut advertisement

While the Stonewall Riots ended harassment by the NYPD, they did not end discrimination. For example, in 1998, Matthew Shepard, a student at the University of Wyoming, was tortured and beaten to death for being gay. The FBI reports that nearly 20% of the more than 7,000 hate crimes reported in the U.S. during 2018 targeted people because of their sexual orientation (Federal Bureau of Investigation 2018).

Prior to the 2003 Supreme Court ruling in Lawrence v. Texas, homosexual activity was illegal in some states. In June 2020, the Supreme Court ruled that the 1964 Civil Rights Act protects gay and transgender workers from discrimination . In some states, people are now protected by law against hate crimes for their sexual orientation. As noted however, such hate crimes are on the rise in the United States. Furthermore, LGBT individuals were precluded from serving in the U.S. military prior to receiving limited protection under President Clinton’s “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” directive in 1994. This policy was repealed by President Obama in 2011, eliminating restrictions on military service because of one’s sexual orientation. In 2015, the Supreme Court ruled in Obergefell v. Hodges that states could no longer prevent couples of the same sex from getting married. However, in Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission (2018), the Supreme Court decided that a public accommodation (a cake baker) could refuse to serve a same-sex couple because he claimed to do so violated his First Amendment rights of free speech and free exercise of religion.

Same-sex couples are common in advertisements today, and unlike the turmoil surrounding Hallmark Channel’s decision to air Zola’s commercial featuring two brides, have had little negative reaction of late. That was not always the case. Despite portrayals of a gay characters on television as early as Billy Crystal’s Jodie Dallas character in the sitcom Soap in 1977, advertisers were slow to do the same. IKEA was the first company to feature a gay couple in a U.S. television commercial in 1994. American Family Association called for a boycott of IKEA because of the ad. In 1997, Volkswagen ran an ad with two men that may have been a couple. In 2008, Pepsi Max ran an ad that depicted a man passing up female models to talk to another man at the end of the bar. That same year Heinz advertised Deli Mayo, where two men kissed goodbye when they left for work. After consumer complaints, the Heinz ad was pulled. In 2012, One Million Moms, the same group that attacked the Hallmark Channel, voiced opposition to JC Penny’s for using Ellen DeGeneres, an openly gay actress and comedian, as its spokesperson. These examples demonstrate the interplay between advertising and society as values and norms change.

As discussed in the previous section, professional sport is an expression of American culture. It wasn’t until 1981 that tennis great Billie Jean King became the first prominent female athlete to come out as lesbian. She waited so long as she was afraid that coming out would have damaged the emergence of women’s professional tennis. Despite agreeing to have Phillip Morris’ Virginia Slims cigarettes sponsor professional women’s tennis, King lost endorsement deals after she came out as advertisers exerted their values onto society or reacted out of fear of alienating customers. The sport of tennis faced a dilemma when Renne Richards had male-to-female reassignment surgery and fought unsuccessfully to compete as a woman in the 1976 U.S. Open. She did win the right to compete in 1977. Robert Dover was the first out gay Olympic athlete in 1988. In 2015 U.S. Olympian Adam Rippon came out despite fears that he may be judged differently. As society’s social values have changed on LGBTQ so have the images we see in advertising. In the 2020 Super Bowl Budweiser featured Ali Kroeger and Ashlyn Harris two members of the women’s U.S. national soccer team World Cup champions who are married.

The struggle is often more difficult in team sports where men who come out often fear of losing the bond they have with teammates and women feel pressure to hide their sexuality due to public stigma (Elks 2018). In the National Football league six former players have come out after they retired; there has not been anyone who came out while still playing. Athletes in other sports are more forthcoming. There were 40 out LGTBQ+ participants in the 2019 Women’s World Cup (Villarreal 2019). In addition, recently a Division 1 college football player Xavier Colvin came out.

In the interplay between marketing and society, brands struggled to keep up with rapid social change and to market simultaneously to minority and mainstream consumers. In 2015, numerous ads appeared featuring gay couples, including Kohl’s, Campbell’s Soup, and Tylenol. At this point, marketers began to depict same-sex couples to show they understood gay pride and to recognize the need to be inclusive of the LGTBQ community. This is the same year that the Supreme Court decision made same-sex marriage legal anywhere in the country. Chobani’s commercial featuring two women in bed was both sensual and sweet but received a negative response from One Million Moms. Wells Fargo’s ad touched viewers as it showed two women learning sign language to adopt a deaf daughter. Honey Maid went further to feature not only a gay couple with a child, but also a biracial family. Campbell’s Soup used humor as two fathers vied to impress their son with their Darth Vader impersonations.

In 2020, there was an openly gay candidate for President of the United States, Pete Buttigieg who was forthcoming in his marketing communications about his sexual orientation. The 2020 Super Bowl had nine advertisements with LGTBQ inclusion. The Microsoft ad featured Katie Sowers, who is the Assistant Offensive Coach for the San Francisco 49ers, a true trailblazer in the National Football league, and who told her story, which includes sexual discrimination. Additionally, LGBTQ icons Ellen DeGeneres and Portia de Rossi appeared in an ad for Amazon Alexa.

Lesbian and gay people are now commonly depicted in ads and now other members of the LGTB community are portrayed in advertising. However, the 2020 Super Bowl also featured trans actresses Isis King and Trace Lysette in a Turbo Tax ad. Furthermore, Pop-Tarts featured the non-binary “Queer Eye” star, Jonathan Van Ness. Bisexual TV host Lilly Singh was portrayed an astronaut in an Oil of Olay ad for Proctor & Gamble’s #MakeSpaceForWomen campaign. In addition, the Sabra hummus ad featured two former “RuPaul’s Drag Race competitors, Kim Chi and Miz Cracker. The Tide ad featured Emily Hampshire from Schitts Creek who recently disclosed she was pansexual. This was important representation for the LBTQ community. However, not everyone was happy, as the One Million Moms worked unsuccessfully to have these ads removed (Hornik 2020).

While we see more LGTBQ characters in mainstream advertising as society influences advertising, there has also been an increase in ads that target the LGTBQ market as a segment with advertising working to influence these consumers. For example, Biktarvy, an HIV-1 drug, runs a campaign with two males who are clearly a couple. This disease affects gay men disproportionately (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention 2017). There are several cruise lines that advertise gay and lesbian cruises, featured on the Travel Channel. Furthermore, advertisers have realized this population does not have a uniform identity. The community often has a united front in political and social issues, but their consumer behavior and response to advertising varies. In a meta-analysis, Eisand and Herman (2019) found that “incongruence between imagery, consumer characteristics, cultural values…results in unfavorable responses to homosexual advertising imagery” (p. 380).

Socio-cultural change coupled with changes in laws have led society to influence advertising. Rising support for the LGBTQ community and significant buying power of this community has gained the attention of marketers and advertisers. As we have discussed many companies now feature LGTBQ+ characters in ads. We anticipate that increasing societal acceptance will lead to more LGTBQ marketing and advertising. On the other hand, Absolut is an example of an advertiser seeming to actively influence society’s values Absolut hopes other companies “will listen, learn, and take action (Stiffler, 2020).

Our analysis finds that discrimination in society meant that there was not much advertising depicting LGTBQ characters until society values shifted. With time changes in social roles, values and norms gave rise to legal and political change. Society has influenced the portrayal of the LGTBQ community in advertising. While some firms are committed to the LGBTQ community, others are likely attracted to this segment of the market’s buying power.

Women and their Reflection in Advertising

Although women constitute a slight majority of the U.S. population (50.8%) (U.S. Census Bureau 2019), they make up less than half of the workforce (47%) (U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics 2020). Women also make less money than men. The median weekly earnings for women 16 years and older in 2018 was $789 vs. $973 for their male counterparts (U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics 2019a). In the early part of the 20th Century, 44% of single women worked outside the home, but only 6% of married women did so (Caplow, Hicks, and Wattenberg 2000). By 1998, the figures were 69% and 61% respectively. In 2018, among the 60 million American families with husbands and wives, both worked in nearly half of them (U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics 2019b). The major events in the fight for women’s rights are detailed in Table 4.

In the late 1800s and early 1900s, women were targeted with homemaker products such as Betty Crocker. Later in the 1930s, women were portrayed as objects of sexual desire, but still homemakers. In 1931 Listerine featured a photograph of a woman’s nude back and a side of her breast. Woodbury soap has an advertisement of a nude woman in 1936 in black and white.

During World War II, while so many American men were in the military fighting the war, women found opportunities in jobs that had traditionally been held by men. A Westinghouse Electric advertisement in 1943 boosted morale with the slogan “We Can Do It!. “Eureka Vacuum depicted women in military uniforms, work pants, and typical housewife garb signaling to women in society they could labor, keep the household running and look glamorous. After the war, these positions reverted back to the returning war veterans and those women who chose to stay in the workforce were channeled into clerical positions and professions like teaching and nursing. Access to professional schools of law, medicine, and business was limited and high paying jobs in construction and transportation were strictly given to men. The images of women as homemakers was reinforced in television sitcoms of the day such as the Donna Reed Show and I Love Lucy, and in advertisements for detergent, mixers, and a kitchen phone as detailed in Table 4. Through the 1950s, women were predominantly portrayed as wives and mothers.

During the 1960s and into the 1970s, as the counterculture movement was gained ground, the Women’s Movement arose. Women expressed dissatisfaction with the status quo. Women no longer wanted to be considered as their husband’s legal adjunct as some states held. They began to demand equal rights, amendment or no. Feminism grew, with spokeswomen such as writers Germaine Greer and Betty Friedan. Issues included reproductive rights, equal pay, domestic violence and sexual harassment. The advertising industry experienced a major change in 1966 when Mary Wells became the chairman of the Wells, Rich and Greene agency. Wells was the first female at the helm of a company listed on the New York Stock Exchange and her advertisements are part of advertising legend including Alka Seltzer campaigns: “Plop plop, fizz fizz,” “Try it, you’ll like it” and “I can’t believe I ate the whole thing” (AdAge 2019) .The socio-cultural changes were depicted in advertising. With the Feminism movement in the 1960s how women were represented in the media began to change. A good example is campaigns like Virginia Slims’ 1968 You’ve Come a Long Way Baby and Enjoli Perfume’s 1978 ‘Cause I’m a Woman, advertisers have recognized the changing role of women in the workplace and began speaking to them through their ads. In 1969, there was a protest outside of Macy’s department store against the image of women in advertising. Within the past several years, the Me Too Movement has taken up the mantle of sexual harassment and sexual violence again, bringing down many powerful men in the process.

Another of the precipitating factors in the feminist movement of the 1960s was the introduction of the first birth control pill in 1960. The “Pill” gave women control over their reproductivity and with that sexual freedom that they could not enjoy earlier. The 1973 Supreme Court decision, Roe v. Wade, gave women access to safe abortions in any state. This struggle has continued over the years and in 2020 the Supreme Court ruled to again to stop antiabortion momentum.

The 1964 Civil Rights Act made it illegal for employers to discriminate against women. However, women still make less money than their male counterparts, even after adjusting for differences in professions. The Equal Rights Amendment to the US Constitution, intended to give equal legal rights to all American citizens regardless of sex, was approved by Congress in 1972, nearly fifty years after it was first introduced. In January 2020, Virginia became the 38th state to ratify the Amendment, the number necessary for an amendment to the Constitution to be ratified. However, because of the length of time from issuance, five other states may have revoked their ratifications because of deadlines that were set in their approvals.

In the 1970s the depiction of women rapidly changed. One famous campaign was the Charlie perfume ad in 1973 that featured women in pantsuits. Polaroid ran an ad with a woman fixing a car. The 1980s portrayed women as “supermom” who ran the household and had a career. In 1980 Ralph Lauren depicted women as career-minded supermoms in double-breasted suits showing how changes in society about women’s roles were reflected in advertising. One campaign, “Jockey for Her,” focused on women from a range of professions and it was a major success. In the 1990s there was a dramatic change where liberated women were portrayed in ads. In 1992, Tyra Banks signed with Cover Girl. She was the first non-white women in major cosmetics advertising. By the turn of the 21st century, more positive images of women in advertising took hold.

The first woman was elected to Congress in 1916 before the 19th Amendment to the Constitution gave women the right to vote. The first woman was elected to the US Senate in 1932. However, only recently has there been a significant increase in the number of women in Congress. In 1933 President Franklin Roosevelt appointed a woman to his cabinet. Madeleine Albright became the first female Secretary of State, the most powerful cabinet position in 1997. In 1981 Sandra Day O’Connor was sworn in as the first woman to serve on the Supreme Court. In 1984, Walter Mondale named Geraldine Ferraro as his vice presidential running companion, the first time in US history that a woman was on the ticket for one of the two top spots for a major party. The next time was Sarah Palin as a vice-president with John McCain in 2008. In 2016 Hilary Clinton was a presidential candidate.

Changes in education have enabled women to enter positions from which they had been discouraged or even excluded in the past. Women now outnumber men in college, representing more than 56% of the enrollment (Marcus 2017). In 2017, women outnumbered men in medical schools for the first time (Jaschik 2017) and made up the majority of law school students (Rowe 2018). Positions in the military, police, firefighting, and emergency medical services are increasingly being filled by women. Furthermore, women are rising to senior managerial and leadership roles in government, politics, nonprofits, and business. In 2019, 33 CEOs of Fortune 500 firms were women (Connley 2019).

In advertising we witness the interplay between society and advertising. In 1995 Nike ran the “If you let me play” campaign to empower women in sport. Dove empowered women with the “Real Beauty” campaign. Surprisingly, our historical analysis revealed advertisers such as Carl’s Jr running a campaign with scantily clad women in 2005. In 2011, a Mr. Clean campaign told women to “get back to the job that really matters,” cleaning, see Figure 4.

OPEN IN VIEWER

Figure 4.

Mr. Clean advertisement.

Even as women enter top positions, there is still a fight for women’s rights. The Me Too movement has focused on the fight against sexual harassment and assault. This movement began quietly online in 2006 and has gained steam over the years. The inappropriate treatment of women by individuals and companies has been brought to light. The case of the powerful Harvey Weinstein has been brought to the light how influential men can exploit women. In the case of Weinstein, he was accused of exploiting his position to sexually assault and rape women. Weinstein being found guilty is being described as a watershed moment for the Me Too movement. On the company side, Victoria’s Secret has been accused of degrading their female employees and treating women as commodities.

Sport often mirrors changes in the overall environment. The first instance of women in sport began started in the end of the 19th century. Women in the upper social class participated in horseback riding, archery, golf, tennis, skiing, and skating. They first competed in the Olympics in 1922 in the “women’s Olympics.” In the 1940s, softball leagues developed, and black athletes participated in segregated track. After the U.S. entry into World War II the All-American Girls Professional Baseball league developed. The league required high levels of femininity and was portrayed in Penny Marshall’s 1992 film “A League of Their Own.” Until 1967 women were not allowed to run in the Boston Marathon.

In 1972, Title IX was passed thanks to the momentum of the civil rights and feminist movements. Title IX mandated that no one based on sex in the United States can be excluded from participation be denied the benefits of or be subjected to discrimination under any education program that receives federal financial aid. As a result, participation in women’s sports grew dramatically at the high school and college levels. The impact reached the professional level as well. In many sports, women now compete for equal prize money (e.g., major tennis tournaments) while in some sports, women are still fighting for equal prize money (women’s soccer).

While women in sport have made great strides, there is still a stereotypical portrayal of women. In 2016, Nike launched the ‘Unlimited’ campaign to demonstrate the possibility of participating in athletics. In the campaign, Serena Williams is portrayed as a great tennis player who is powerful and talented. However, she is consistently in full makeup, with nail polish and tight-fitting clothes. On a more positive note Misty Copeland, the first black principal ballerina in the American Ballet, is portrayed in an Under Amour campaign as an au natural, hard-working, inspiration achieving her fullest potential.

One particularly responsive marketer over time has been General Mills with the image of the Betty Crocker brand. From the initial 1921 image, Betty was transformed in 1931 to a scientific home economist. After several more changes that reflected in women’s changing role in society and their relationships with baking, in 1996 Betty emerged with a computer-generated look that was the amalgam of 75 American women who represented the spirit of Betty Crocker (Betty Crocker Kitchens 2017; Freund 1996; Kirby 1996). The new Betty, morphed from these 75 women, could be Caucasian, Hispanic, Asian, or Native American, making it easier for many more women to identify with the icon. Recent advertising has moved toward showing men in roles that were traditionally held by women, such as doing laundry and rearing children. Tide has a campaign entitled “Mom Dad,” where a stay-at-home dad is shown as a competent person taking care of chores and children. Dads as involved parents is now represented in mainstream media (Campana, Van den Bossche, and Miller 2020). Many advertisements are now featuring women in traditionally male roles such as physicians or business executives.

Our analysis finds that initially advertising worked to influence societal images of women. Over time changes in social roles, values and norms gave rise to legal and political change. Society influence the portrayal of women in advertising. However, the push and pull between advertising and society has mirrored the continued fight for women’s advancement.