Advertising INTRODUCTION are ubiquitous they are everywhere. They creep into virtually ­Advertisements every aspect of life, ­whether ­people realize it or not. The average American is exposed to thousands of ads per day. Researchers who study the phenomenon known as the third-­person effect have documented that even though ­ people tend to think that ­others are more affected by ­these persuasive messages than they are, in fact ­ these messages are decidedly influential. If ads did not work, advertising would not be a multibillion-­ dollar industry. Perhaps more importantly, however, ads do more than just sell products. Advertisements sell values, ideals, standards, expectations, and aspirations. They tell ­people about who they are, where they fall short, and who they should try to be—­and what they say about being a ­ woman in the United States is that the most impor­tant ­thing about her is the way she looks. They tell ­women to do anything and every­ thing to strive for a male-­ constructed (and impossible) ver- sion of absolute perfection, while at the same time telling them that they ­will inevi- tably fail. Ads foster a culture in which it is acceptable to routinely scrutinize ­ women’s bodies, romanticizing and stylizing vio­lence against ­ women. This is what moves the world of advertising from merely sexist to outright misogynist. HISTORY The American Marketing Association defines advertising as “any paid form of nonpersonal communication about an organ­ization, product, ser­vice, or idea by an identified sponsor” (cited in Hanson 2017, p. 274). Advertising is not a form of media per se, but it makes pos­ si ­ ble the vast array of media available to consumers. The role of ads in the business of mass media in the United States cannot be over- stated: without ad revenue, most media would go ­under. Advertising has been part of U.S. media culture since colonial times, but the reliance on images to sell prod- ucts is a more recent phenomenon. Benjamin Franklin, a pioneer of early advertis- ing, made ads attractive to readers by using large headlines and substantial white space, much like modern-­ day classified ads, and advertising remained largely
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