An exploration of the representations of ethnic minorities through time and how it affects their sense of identity.
Identity is the concept of oneself, this includes the perceptions people have about themselves, their abilities, status and worth. This is developed largely to social factors, the work of George Herbert Mead, puts forward the theory that you are not born with an identity but rather develop in through time through social interactions and societies expectations and portrayal of you. The advertising industry throughout time has been responsible for damaging ethnic minorities, causing inferiority complexes. This essay will examine examples through time and how the advertising industry effects the identities of ethnic minorities.
A recurring mage in past advertising is the idea of white skin being more pure clean an healthy than darker skin. The soap industry played on the idea continuously to increase sales. The first image shows and advert for ‘Cooks “Lightning” Soap’ (Late 1800s) where a white woman has washed a child, his body remains black but his face is white. The connotations of this are the white skin is pure, where as black skin is dirty and inferior and is something that needs to be cleaned.
The images show children who are washed from black until white, signifying that the black children are dirty and need to be cleaned if they want to fit in. (Cooks Lightening Soap, 1800’s) One of the most disturbing this about the adverts is the children in the back of the advert, they look as though they are ecstatic for they're friend who has been washed away of his ethic identity. Similarly in the next advert (1884 Pears’ Soap advert) , a white child is washing a black child, this gives the advert a sort of playful tone. This imagery was anything but uncommon, it was a recurring theme in soap advertising, the implication being that black skin was undesirable and dirty. The effect this sort of advertising would have on a ethnic minorities identity would be that they would begin to develop an inferiority complex from a young age, they would be socialised to believe that they are outside of the social norm and therefore develop a damaged sense of identity.
Overtime studies have been carried out to assess how ethnic minority children view themselves in comparison to white children. These studies aimed to highlight the children inferiority complex nd how mass media has damaged their personal and ethnic identity.
Psychologists Kenneth B. Clark and Mamie K. Phipps Clarke in the 1940s conducted an experiment called ‘The Doll Test’ (‘The Development of Consciousness of Self and the Emergence of Racial Identification in Negro Preschool Children’). In this experiment children were asked to describe the characteristics of various dolls. Many black children from across America consistently (however not all) identified the black dolls as ‘ugly’ and ‘dirty’ whilst when shown the white dolls they used words such as ‘pretty’, ‘clean’ and ‘nice’. This experiment highlights the way that media outlets have effected the way that ethnic minorities view themselves and their own sense of self, distinguishing lighter skin as cleaner, showing that the stereotypes from past generations still remain intact in ethnic minorities.
This Nadinola skin whitening and hair straightening campaigns from the 1950s and 1960s, highlight how the advertising industry and beauty industry effects the identity of ethnic minorities. The sale and advertisement of these products, shows that the internalisation of white beauty standards makes ethnic minority women (and men alike although there is less examples of this) feel as though to conform to any sort of regular beauty standard they must adjust their natural look to look and feel as though they are conforming to the social norms of society. In the picture on the left, the advertisement for the skin whitening product, there is figures of two men, this advertisement implies that to be able to attract male attention, they would first need to adjust their look to conform more the white beauty standards. The second advertisement below, on the right, shows an advertisement for a hair straightening product,straight hair is a classic feature of a caucasian persn. This advert plays on the idea that straight hair is the beauty standard and that anything else is unacceptable. The model in the advert also had very white features, a thin nose and thin lips, also non stereotypical of a black woman. Both these advertisements depict how white beauty standards are given to ethnic minorities, where their own beauty is the antithesis of beauty, a hierarchy imposed by white cultural. From this we can see that the cultural identity of ethnic minorities would be effected, the refection of african heritage minimised in hope for acceptance in a society which values white beauty standards.Skipping forward to a modern context, we can see that although these ideas of beauty are outdated, they are still subtle ingrained into out society.
Susan L Bryant’s essay ‘The Beauty Ideal: The Effects of European Standards of Beauty on Black Women’ proposes the idea that black women are very vulnerable to the effects of the european standard of beauty can cause. These standards emphasise white skin tones and straight hair, this excludes many black women, especially those of a particularly dark skin tone. In addition she adds that sociologist Gordon, M.K. (2008, Media contributions to African American girls’ focus on beauty and appearance) study found black children are particularly vulnerable to the media portrayals due to their higher rates of media consumption and found that young black girls strongly identified with black music and television stars, however these women were conforming to a european standard of beauty, causing a inferiority complex in the young girls.
Below we can see two blatant cases of ‘white-washing’. White-washing is the process of digitally enchanting a persons skin to appear whiter, it is common within advertising and magazine covers. This backs up Gordon’s study, black girls aim to have whiter features,due to the lack of true dark skin tones seen within advertising and the media. We can see that even in a modern context, the ideas of the past still remain, the westernised beauty standards of light skin, thin features are still among us. This white washing, socialises ethnic minorities to see they're skin tones and features as different to the standard of beauty. This therefore can be damaging to personal identity and make ethnic minorities believe that by getting rid of their own cultural identity, they can somehow achieve the standard of beauty that society wants of them. Meeta Rani Jha’s book ‘The Global Beauty Industry’ investigates the second-wave feminist protests and feminist history. She puts forward the idea of ‘beauty as capital’ to demonstrate how beauty can be used as a commodity exchanged for class mobility. one of the keys things she speaks abut is the emphasise of ‘black is beautiful’ movement in the 1960s, which is one of the most significant anti-racist challenges to the dominant white beauty. The book focuses on the expansion of capitalism to India resulting in Indian women perception of beauty becoming white. These white beauty norms which affect the Indian women are, the globalisation of beauty pageants and the role of capitalism and media in skin-colour discrimination. Jha talks about how white supremacy creates an idealistic white beauty, where if your skin is lighter you are more moral and more attractive however if your skin is darker you are less beautiful and more immoral. Jha also points out that the beauty industry leans towards white women, so no matter how many beauty products an ethnic minority uses, she will never be able to live to the standard that is expected of her.
The series of adverts below, show exactly how Meeta Rani Jha’s theory comes to life, even though there are black female models depicted in all of these adverts, they look nearly identical to the white models completely irradiating their natural black features. Although these women may look like this, what this advert in inherently doing is seeking beauty, therefore each other them are seeking the idea that having white features is the standard of beauty. These adverts are trying to put across the point in a nutshell, that women of colour can be beautiful, as long as they meet the
standards of white beauty, this can cause
an inferiority complex.n this modern advert for skin whitening cream, we can see how the white beauty standards are still at play. The advert highlights the creams benefit which is to make dark skin women lighter, this advert is suggesting that the lighter the skin the more attractive, it is a similar composition hat you might see on a mascara advert, one side with no products used and then one side with the products used and the subject looking ‘better’. By reinforcing the standard that lighter skin is better, it effects darkskinned women to still believe that they should still aim to meet the white standards of beauty.
Although the argument put forward earlier in this essay (‘The Doll Test’, ’The Development of Consciousness of Self and the Emergence of Racial Identification in Negro Preschool Children’) is outdated now, Kiri Davis, in 2005 redid this test to see the effects, 20 black children were told to select the ‘nice doll’ and out of the 20, 15 picked the white doll. this shows that the standard of beauty being white had come forward but not changed and still damages the identity of young ethnic minorities today. In todays world, many children are still sent home from school for ‘inappropriate’ hair styles and adults denied jobs being told they need to straighten their hair, this shows that white beauty standards from pre 1950s morals are still among us today, even if not in the same severity.
Alternatively, some forms of advertising in modern day, use the figure of a ‘white crusader’ this has a damaging effect on ethnic minority identity , as it shows a white person in a position of power, where they have no right to take the centre stage.
The ‘Live for Now’ Pepsi advert, featuring Kendall Jenner was released on April 4th 2017, the 49th anniversary of Martin Luther King’s assassination and subsequently taken down soon after. This advert is a key example of where the advertising industry has used a white crusader. The advert depicts Kendall Jenner being involved with a photoshoot, then we see an attractive musician call her on and she joins the protest, later we see a female photographer join with her camera. She gives a can of Pepsi to the opposing police officers and she seeming sorts out the situation. This advertisement clearly appropriates the Black Lives Matter movement, whilst portraying the white crusader.
The protests within America for the Black Lives Matter movement have been anything but this festival aesthetic which pepsi portrays, some end with arrests and others even the possibility of tear gas, it is not a beautiful spontaneous moment, it is people coming together to express their views of social inequalities and fighting for justice. Jenner is also seen to take off her wig, trying to depict a ‘natural’ state when she goes into the protest, when removing it she throws in at the black woman next to her without even acknowledging her. The fact she does not acknowledge her shows white privilege and superiority in action. The last scene shows Jenner giving a can of Pepsi to a police officer, mimicking a real incident during a Black Lives Matter protest, responding to the shooting of Alton Sterling and Philando Castile, where Ieshia Evans attempted to negotiate with the police, this was immortalised in a photograph named ‘Taking a Stand in Baton Rouge’ and has since become a symbol for the Black Lives Matter movement. Unfortunately Evans was arrested for trying to negotiate, rather than solving everything like Jenner. The last scene also shows similarities to the Baltimore riots, when a young black boy tried to give a bottle of water to a police officer, however he rejected it. From these two incidences it is clear that Pepsi were trying to exploit the somewhat ‘trend’ of the movement for financial gain. The Black Lives Matter movement is currently a movement that many ethnic minorities would relate to and feel passionately about, by taking Jenner and using her as the protagonist in this advertisement, this reiterates to the community the superiority of caucasian people and has a damaging affect on the cultural and self identity of ethnic minorities, by undermining the process of protesting and glorifying the whit protagonist.
Overall this essay highlights how white standards of beauty put forward by the advertising industry and the media can be damaging to the cultural and self identities of ethnic minorities. From pre 1900s soap adverts discarding dark skin as ‘dirty’, skin whitening and hair straightening products from the 1950s reinforcing white standards of beauty, to modern day white-washing of mass media photographers and skin whitening products which are still available today and lastly the use of the ‘white crusader’ figure, reducing ethnic minorities achievements to that of a white protagonist.