Gender Expectations in Advertisement

The medium we will pay attention to is print and television advertisement. Companies play into our society’s gender expectations when presenting, let’s say, an advertisement for a Disney Princess doll or Power Rangers action figure. In the images below you can see a young male child playing with a Power Rangers toy and another playing with a Star Wars Lightsaber. Both of these franchises in fact have female characters so the question arises “Why do they not depict young female children playing with the female character counterparts?” The implication within these types of advertisement is that girls are not “into” Star Wars or Power Rangers because these are “boy’s toys.”

(Target Ad October 26-November 26, 2014)

(Target Ad October 26-November 26, 2014)