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How women have been stereotyped in Pakistani ads for the last 70 years

How women have been stereotyped in Pakistani ads for the last 70 years

The Uks Resource Centre’s Diary 2020 has compiled all Pakistani advertisements to show how things were and what changed.
Updated 19 Jan, 2020

The old black and white image of a smiling woman balancing a man’s shoe on her head makes one wonder about the kind of mindset behind the shoe advertisement.

Although other reproduced advertisements in the Uks Resource Centre’s Diary 2020 titled Advertising — Women of Pakistan: Time to See and be the Change, which was launched here on Saturday, may not be as shocking, several still show men and women in stereotypical roles.

For example, women are shown promoting cooking oil, serving tea, selling beauty soap, fairness creams and shampoos while the men are depicted selling shaving razors.

But, there are advertisements showing couples riding bicycles, a little girl and a little boy fixing their toy car or skipping rope together, and women breaking free from the clutches of centuries-old stereotypical gender roles by working as taxi drivers or chemists and girls excelling in sports or studies.

‘Since feminism is selling these days, we are getting to watch men serving tea for their better halves’

According to the Uks director, since 1998 they have taken care to bring out a diary every year which has a fresh and meaningful theme. This time the 2020 diary is about advertising and how women have been portrayed in Pakistani advertising through the years and what kind of advertisements are printed or broadcast here.

For this, the Uks team combed extensively through archival material from the 1950s onwards to learn about the kind of advertisements produced during those days. A marked difference found between advertisements being produced today and those made decades ago is that modern ads contain far more glamour and artificiality with sexual connotations.

Ad and PR woman and human rights communications expert, Seema Jaffer said that women are influenced by ad campaigns but a recent change that she has seen is women raising their voices against what they see and don’t like.

“For instance, Pakistani cricketer and [former captain of Pakistan’s women cricket team] Sana Mir recently called out [film star] Mahira Khan’s hair removal cream ad for body-shaming girls,” she said.

She also felt that putting women behind the camera was also bringing about a change in the kind of advertising shown on TV but there was now a need for men to change their way of thinking and see women in a new light.

Journalist Afia Salam shared her observations about advertisements on television which give the impression that boys’ diet is more important than girls’. So they are shown gulping down milk and food supplements while girls are shown enjoying cola drinks, she said.

“In India, there has been a shift in beauty standards with the ‘Dark is Beautiful’ campaign in which actress Nandita Das talks about the obsession of Indians for fair skin. But she is spreading awareness about the unjust effects of skin colour discrimination.”

“The campaign challenges the belief that the value and beauty of people are determined by the fairness of their skin colour. And here we have slogans such as ‘Gora hoga Pakistan’ giving way to low self-esteem,” she said.

But, the advertisement agencies are after all a service industry where the client is always right and clients usually feel that girls add glamour to ads, she said.

Psychologist Dr Asha Bedar reminded that young people are impressionable and advertisements change with trends and demands.

She pointed out, “Trends won’t change until societal thinking changes. Since feminism is selling these days, we are getting to watch men serving tea for their better halves.”

“But advertisements, where a husband is ridiculed at work for his dirty shirt and daughters-in-law trying to appease their mothers-in-law with their cooking, are still very much there.”

Originally published in Dawn, January 19th, 2020

Comments

M. Saeed Jan 19, 2020 04:49pm
Advertisers exploit the good looks of the women to sell their products. It is another form of the skin-trade.
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Syed H Jan 19, 2020 06:46pm
The title of this piece reads: "How women have been stereotyped in Pakistani ads for the last 70 years". Yes women undoubtedly have been stereotyped in Pakistan ads for the last 70 years, but can anyone name a single country in the world where they have not? Patriarchy is not something that is uniquely the monopoly of one country, but is something that afflicts the whole world. Indeed, one could argue that the misogyny of Western advertising in the last 70 years, with a relentless objectification of women that continues to this day, has been a key driver in advertising the world over, given the West's influence. In its early days, the Pakistani advertising industry was often little more than a copy of Western advertising especially in the segments of the media that were in English (just take Dawn from the 1960s and see for yourself). Yes, do address the issue of gender representation in Pakistan head-on, but do also locate this struggle in the broader global context it belongs to.
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fraghat ki aadat Jan 19, 2020 09:46pm
Excellent analysis. We have a long to go.
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Amer Jan 19, 2020 10:32pm
Same thing is happening in West and North America as well. They are Selling a car in a ad and a girl is sexy clothing and the voice say test drive her. Why Pakistan is single out?
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N abidai Jan 19, 2020 11:23pm
How women are stereotyped by the bussiness 's, by not pursing the 52% of women into work force,by setting up respectful environments. Improving the transit systems ,the hotels where women if single is look at differently, can not feel safe to stay . Blaming the Ad's ,and actresses ,seems to be a easy target for the narrow minded people !
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Ibrahim S Jan 19, 2020 11:46pm
It’s a known fact that women dress up to get noticed by other women (sorry men). That is perfectly ok but the main focus should be how she excels in other segments of society . Recently all parties ( except some Neanderthal ) making women inclusive in political platform . Men please remember , you don’t own women and they are not men’s property to settle score
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Daskalos Jan 20, 2020 08:04am
A good article. It's high time we broke many cultural stereotypes especially via public advertising.
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HashBrown® Jan 20, 2020 08:21pm
@Syed H Excellent post brother.
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Lala Khan Jan 22, 2020 12:16pm
Women in Pakistan would have gone way ahead. It was the brutal regime of ZIA UL HAQ which put brakes to the advancement of women.
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