On my refrigerator door, among travel magnets, postcards, and photographs, I keep a magnet from an old Volkswagen advertisement, published in the 60s, which says: “He: goes to work in the morning and returns at night / She: takes the children to school. Goes to the market, goes to the hairdresser, picks up mom, picks up the children from school, goes to the seamstress. Takes mom home. Goes shopping in town. Returns the nephews and nieces, goes to visit friends, goes to see how Aunt Celina is doing, returns to a friend's house to pick up the purse she had forgotten, etc., etc., etc. / Isn't it fair that she has a Volkswagen all to herself?”
I often look at this advertisement and reflect on how representative it once was. Yes, today we might find it outdated, old-fashioned, stereotypical. But, just a few years ago, the role of women was exactly and only this: to take care of the house, the children, and themselves.
Using the logic of Grant McCracken, an anthropologist and researcher of material culture, advertising is an instrument that assigns meaning to consumer goods based on meanings that already exist in the culturally constituted world. Thus, associating the male figure with work and the female figure with domestic chores seemed to be a coherent choice. After all, it functioned as a mirror of what was culturally and socially dictated.
That's why, until recently, it was common to encounter sexist advertising messages (how can we forget beer commercials?); racist messages; fatphobic messages; heteronormative messages. Messages that reinforced sociocultural patterns and encouraged consumption for its own sake. Messages that reflected the prejudices and consumerism of an extremely unequal and segregationist society.
I don't think we live so far from that. Often, cancel culture and online boycotts signal mistakes made by various types of brands and corporations in their communications and positioning. But, at the same time, we are witnessing the growth of the consumer movement and the transformation of genuine purpose into brand value. Advertising, therefore, has reflected and produced the desires, beliefs, and needs of a world in transformation.
As consumers, we are more informed and therefore more demanding. As citizens, we have begun to use consumption as a form of political positioning. As communication professionals, we are more attentive to the stances of the brands we work for, ensuring that raising certain issues goes beyond mere communication activism. Skrivanek svetainės vertimas
In my advertising classes, I always emphasize how important it is to view advertisers as agents of history. Our advertisements both represent the behaviors, values, tastes, and habits of each era, and act as machines for constructing meaning, embodying the spirit of each time. I invite you, dear reader, on a journey of understanding our culture through the world of advertising.
For those who want to dive in…
DOMINGUES, Izabela. MIRANDA, Ana Paula de. Consumption of activism . Barueri, SP: Estação das Letras e Cores, 2018.
MCCRACKEN, Grant. Culture and Consumption : New Approaches to the Symbolic Character of Goods and Consumption Activities. Rio de Janeiro: Mauad, 2003.
PEREZ, Clotilde. Advertising and the spirit of the times : under the iconography of reflection or indication of paths? São Paulo: ECA USP, 2014.
ROCHA, Everardo. Magic and capitalism: an anthropological study of advertising. 4th ed. São Paulo: Brasiliense, 2010.
