Sexist Coffee Advert -1960

An old Advert for 'Mountain Grown Coffee' made during the 1960's portraying the woman as the stay at home wife and the man as the 'bread winner'. This could be great to play with during our filming tomorrow as we could play with role reversals and shows how long the Media has been generalizing gender roles.

Facebook Group:

http://www.facebook.com/groups/437908196244603/439126292789460/?notif_t=group_comment

Above is a link to a collaborative Facebook group for this body of work. I have included a link to it as it contains discussion and research in relation to our group practice.

hello   you lovely lot  here is  an example of gender roles in advertising,   she discusses  many   gender issues  many of  us  are already brining  up these  touches  but  she presents these ideas very clearly   - could be useful   when  trying to maintain a level of  balance   in  our  work  xx

Plan of Action via Facebook 16/10/2012

Mindmaps from group discussions on 11/10/2012

 

During our group discussion we produced several mindmaps/spidermaps - detailing our ideas with regard to gender roles in the media and presenting ideas. 

 

We discussed how the media today- particularly advertising, still seem intent on stereotyping the sexes (i.e. women seen as homemakers, weaker sex, nagging, here to serve men's needs, only interested in the superficial -make-up, hair etc  but occasionally shown as having the upper-hand and men seen as the breadwinners, strong, interested in sport, cars etc, powerful but also sometimes seen as perhaps being hard done by or a bit clueless when it comes to women) instead of promoting an equal viewpoint on both. 

 

It was suggested that we could create a flashmob - where we turn up as a group to a public place and act out some stereotypical ideas regarding gender but reverse the roles.  A couple of ideas suggested included (1) going to a pub/bar i.e. men take on the stereotypical actions of the women e.g. going to the toilets together - checking their hair, spraying perfume, and the women drinking pints, watching skysports and adjusting themselves(!) or (2) building site i.e. women shouting, learing and gesturing at the workmen.

 

Another idea which could be included under the flashmob idea, was to film a parody of certain stereotyping adverts i.e. lynx affect - which could also be filmed in a public place to show the reality of "the lynx affect" as opposed to what the advert suggests.  This could be edited with the original advert to show the differences/expections/realities.

 

Also, we discussed doing a similar film to the Prodigy's "Smack my Bitch up" video but not sure how this could be filmed from a first-person perspective with regard to loaning camera equipment for this type of experiment.

Prodigy video - messing with our heads?

 

The controversial Prodigy video, Smack my Bitch up, 1997 directed by Jonas Akerlund is filmed from a first-person perspective on an eventful (to say the least) night out.  

The video perhaps fools the viewer into believing the protagonist is male because of the stereotypical views one may have of how men and women should or should not behave and this forces the viewer to question their own preconceived ideas of the sexes regarding sexuality, domestic violence, alcohol and drug use etc.

 

References:

 

Akerlund, J. (1997) Smack my Bitch up, Prodigy. London: XL Recordings

Available from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kzojb688aMo

 

TV advertising- sexist? Mitchell and Webb

Just a comedy side of things, Mitchell and Webb seem to sum up the way women and men are stereotyped in adverts. A lot more seems to be aimed at women towards cleaning, beauty and children I find.