Gender Stereotypes In Listerine Advertising

For centuries, advertising has been a powerful way for companies to reach a wide audience of potential consumers and buyers. It has also been a good way to reflect the political, economic, and cultural environments of the community it is targeting. This is why many historians look at advertisements. Doing so allows them to gauge the attitudes and values of the time period and area in which the advertisements were produced and circulated. This idea of advertising and a society’s culture reflecting upon each other applies to a series of advertisements for Listerine antiseptic mouthwash that started circulation in the 1920s and were rebooted in the 1950s. The chosen advertisement was printed in an unknown magazine in approximately 1956, and was marketed towards women. The newer ad, which features similar language to the ads from the 1920s, reflect on insecurities women faced surrounding their appearances and roles in their societies while also showing how certain cultural attitudes have persisted since the ads were printed. On the left side of the advertisement, there is a picture of a young woman. She is wearing a formal dress, fancy jewelry, and her hair is in an updo. She is also

But what makes this Listerine advertisement stand out is how blatant and obvious its sexism is, and how well it worked for Listerine’s sales. By printing advertisements like this and repeatedly using these marketing techniques, Listerine was able to make their product a staple of consumers’ medicine cabinets and influence the way they thought about oral health. However, the sexist phrases used in Listerine advertisements did not create negative attitudes towards women and their roles in society, but rather reflected them and perpetuated them in a way that allows them to persist and linger on in modern