Feminists, Feminisms, and Advertising

Kim Golombisky is associate professor and graduate director in the Department of Women’s and Gender Studies at the University of South Florida.Peggy J. Kreshel is associate professor of advertising at the Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication and affiliate faculty member of the Institute for Women’s Studies at the University of Georgia.

Golombisky and Kreshel provide an original and much-needed feminist exploration of the multiple ways women have engaged advertising, both as workers within the industry and as targeted consumers. The authors in this anthology tackle the historical and contemporary workplace culture in advertising’s creative departments, as well as how women audiences make sense of advertising’s messages—both areas that have long needed the kind of comprehensive and theoretically-informed approach this book provides. In doing so, they address a broad range of issues affecting women and the advertising industry, including ethics, intersectionality, commodity feminism, women of color as audiences, the sexism within the gendered silos that are the creative departments, and feminist education for advertising students. The book is a must-read for advertising students, instructors, and professionals—anyone in or thinking of entering the advertising industry—as well as anyone trying to make sense of the industry’s messages for or about women.

• AcknowledgmentsPart 1: Histories of Feminists, Feminisms, and AdvertisingChapter 1: Introductory Remarks on the Advertising Business and a Community of Feminist Scholars Making Advertising Their BusinessPeggy KreshelChapter 2: Women versus Brands: Sexist Advertising and Gender Stereotypes Motivate Transgenerational Feminist CritiqueJacqueline Lambiase, Carolyn Bronstein, and Catherine A. ColemanChapter 3: The Entangled Politics of Feminists, Feminism, Advertising, and Beauty: A Historical PerspectiveDara Persis MurrayChapter 4: “Don’t You Love Being a Woman?” Advertising, Empowerment, and the Women’s MovementAnn Marie NicolosiPart 2: Encoding: Feminist Critiques of Advertising Professionals and PracticesChapter 5: Black Women and Advertising Ethics: A Womanist PerspectiveJoanna L. JenkinsChapter 6: “What’s Wrong, You Can’t Take a Joke?” Advertisers’ Defenses of Images of Violence against Women in Their Ads, 1979–1989Juliet DeeChapter 7: Exceptional Exemplars: Practitioner