1. Original Coca-Cola TV commercial
Had numerous races along with whites in it, which is pretty surprising considering how old that commercial is.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6mOEU87SBTU
2. The Nike Basketball commercial
Shows different races but in a sports atmosphere.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pPmfbhVGbIQ
3. Mean Joe Green commercial
Another minority is shown in a sports context, instead of just a regular ad.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xffOCZYX6F8
4. Troy Polamalu commercial
Remake of the Mean Joe Green commercial, but with a different race; still a minority and still in reference with sports.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gJu6OrztFwc
5. Cosmopolitan magazine
The very first page and ad is one of Mary J. Blige singing and is for a Citi Bank card
There are about 83 ads, some are with people and some just have products.
Of those 83, there are only 10 minority ads.
In most of the ads I would say about 80% of them were minority celebrities as opposed to minority models nobody knows.
Also, in most of the minority ads there was only one person in the ad, and their body or face took up the whole ad.
6. Fashion Rocks magazine
There were only about 24 ads throughout the entire magazine.
Of those 24 ads, 4 ads had minorities in them.
But, the magazine itself had a vast array of famous actors and musicians throughout it, including minorities.
7. CareerBuilder.com commercial
Doesn't just have white people in it, also has some minorities, although there are more white people than minorities. Plus it is hilarious.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=79tMMFja-Fw&feature=PlayList&p=593B9A455D27422B&index=33
8. Pepsi commercial
The only minorities in this commercial are in the background
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B3ImtTlv5p4
9. Pizza Rolls commercial
There is one black boy with three other white children. It seems like they "had" to put in a minority, so they threw in one black.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DahXeTmT3XA
10. Sonic commercial
No minorities, only white people, as if only white people eat at Sonic.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VjY9VGEUdGs
Reflection--
- I've noticed that in the majority of the commercials and ads there are only white people. Minorities are very underrepresented in the media, which reinforces people's ideas that they aren't as important, they don't matter, and that they are simply just not around.
- As I looked at the ads and watched the commercials it was pretty shocking to notice the lack of minorities. I mean, honestly, if you are not LOOKING for minorities in ads you don't notice the huge disparity between minorities and whites. And in the majority of the minority ads they were widely-known celebrities, instead of just minority models. The NAACP noticed the lack of minorities in ads and sent letters out to companies.
- I read that minorities are statistically represented in four different aspects of the media in ads. One sports, two singing melodic sales pitches, three food, and four alcohol. Along with those they are represented in ads that are geared directly toward a specific minority. Like Ebony magazine is directed to African Americans.
- Another thing I noticed is that commercials and ads NEVER show interracial couples, still to this day they don't. And if they do, it is an Asian with a white person the majority of the time. I would assume this is because Asian Americans are known as the "ideal minority" or "model minority."
- It is pretty sad to be able to notice a lack of an entire group of peoples in our advertising. People watch an entire hour of ads a day on T.V. meaning we are being bombarded with ads filled with only one race thus reinforcing in our minds that our society is completely made up of white people. It is a fake world, that we don't live in.
- Since we are journalism majors, most of us in this class, we should get into our fields and begin the change that this society needs. We need to make sure that minorities are equally represented in the media. I know it doesn't feel like it, but one person trying to do the right thing really does make a difference. And even people who aren't journalism majors, they too need to be the change needed to get rid of the prejudices of the media and in life.
Really interesting videos from Dove:
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Good work. One person can start a movement one person at a time. One journalist or media professional at a time.
ReplyDeleteRachel,
ReplyDeleteI too never noticed the lack of minorities, until I actually looked for it. I specifically looked at more magazine ads, but your take on commericials was interesting to me, because in the ones that you mentioned, I could not think of any instances where I can think of people of color. If there are people of color, it is sometimes like they just stuck them to put the minority factor in. Also, in the new line of Old Navy commercials with the mannequins, I just saw one that featured all white people except for a black couple. To me, it just made their placement in the ad awkward.
I think the representation of minorities mostly as celebrities is interesting. It's almost as if the minorities need to be familiar and likable in order to be non-threatening or look out of place to whites. Or at least the whites that the media tries to cater to-- most of them probably wouldn't care if there was an increase in minority presence in ads. It almost feels like the media is so afraid to include too many minorities that they won't even test it on a large level. On the whole, I doubt any whites would stop buying a product simply because it had minorities in it. I think this is a misconception by the media.
ReplyDeleteI also noticed the issue of only seeing minority celebrities in most advertisements when I was working with my group on our media project. This is something that troubles me. We have a large number of influential minorities in the limelight, so it's not a bad thing that they represent their races in advertisements and such. However, I think that it is not fair to consumers to only see a "representative" or "spokesperson" for a race. Halle Berry and Beyonce are both highly accomplished individuals but that is not a fair representation of all African American women. The same goes with Eva Longoria representing Latinas and so on. Great post.
ReplyDelete