And this is less dehumanizing than a certain book cover? Seriously, I don't mean to bring up old stuff, but when I clicked on the link from Bloglines to read this, I see another cropped body on the left sidebar. I really don't get it.

Veronica, assuming you're referring to the Full Frontal Nudity cover - I don't think the point is that these posters show female figures with their heads cut off, but that the posters with women of color don't show faces, where the blonde White women's faces are shown.

Is this representative of a lot of ads? When i think about it I remember more men in ad's with their heads cropped out than anything else, especially if they are in skimpy clothing, usually to emphasize the abs or back or whatever else. You could roll into A+F and see ads like these with white womens heads cropped out, is one more common than the other?

(edit) duh, I meant Full Frontal Feminism, but was distracted by my lunch.

I've noticed this trend too on book covers (I worked in a bookstore until recently, and saw a lot of stuff come over the desk). On the one hand, it sort of universalizes the graphic, so that the character doesn't have a specific face, etc., but it certainly places emphasis on women's body parts in an unsettling way. See for example this, this, and this.

Whitemore: Is it a Naked Lunch?

As a fat person, I've become attuned to the dehumanizing crop....just about every depiction of large people in the media chops off the head of the fat person. We're just bodies...bodies to be loathed and feared, not individuals with identities and personalities.

It's a similar dehumanizing effect here, except the headless women are supposed to be objects of desire rather than objects of derision.

Either way, objectification rather than identification.

Hey! I recognize that ad! It's a Target ad! I know that because I'm a softlines trainer at Target.

I don't get it. One of the women is very skinny and she has her head cut off, and the other woman has large breasts and what I assume is a full figure and her head is cut off. Maybe this is a stretch, but maybe this is more about race than body type. The two women who's heads are cut off have completely different body types, but they're both African American. I'm leaning in the direction of this being a racist ad.

Screwed. Up.

Persephone -- I think that was the point of the post.

Again, I don't think that every cropped out face is objectification. Sometimes it's just an attempt to emphasize the clothes being modeled, or to allow the potential consumer to identify with the model by presenting just a body rather than the very distinct features of a face and head.

A relevant question might be: at whom is the image aimed? Men buying beer, or other women shopping for underwear? If it's the latter, what is to gain by objectification?

So in this case, I would not argue that it's up-and-down "female objectification", but I would wonder why the white/blonde model deserves to be featured, where as the model(s) of color don't get the same, aherm, face time.

Crazy. Perhaps they were just put up badly *hopes*

As for being 'too PC', check out 'Use of English' by Attila the Stockbroker - it should be about the 4th poem down on this site:
http://www.attilathestockbroker.com/poems.html

Tis rather good :)

They're also guilty of photoshopping out all the meat of the bottom one's arm. Yikes!

http://bp3.blogger.com/_ySCIT3KO9Zc/Rxi2rWmkYFI/AAAAAAAAIMM/ynjMJEQ2EeU/s1600-h/Dim_Paris_Lingerie_ads_1.jpg

As we see in this ad, the black woman is hidden behind a wall of Caucasian women. The only possible explanation is racism.

Nothing is ever a product of coincidence, right?

Wrong.

It's very possible that, in this ad, the black woman's head was cropped off. It doesn't mean that the graphic designer was a racist jerk.

If this logic were right, this picture might insinuate that a white family ought to have a white computer.

http://www.adamsmithcollege.ac.uk/relations/public/pressreleases/images/20060728/01/evelynlawsonsons02.jpg

I'm certain the manufacturer of that laptop would love every family, regardless of race, ought to have laptops in every imaginable color. Not only would they make money from all those sales, but the thought of those computers shaking each other's hands when no one is there to watch is simply touching.

The woman missing her head is not just the non-white woman, but the largest woman. COFRA is running the Show Your Face project at the moment to combat the "anonymous fattie" image.

A relevant question might be: at whom is the image aimed? Men buying beer, or other women shopping for underwear? If it's the latter, what is to gain by objectification?

The image is aimed at women shopping for underwear, but a specific group of women. Target has been revitalizing its brand for some time now. When brands in the '80's were doing this, they said they were appealing to a specific quality of shopper; what they meant was people of a certain income level. Because of the racial disparities in class in our country, this meant that they were aimed generally at white people. The pictures are aimed at white women. They want white women to identify with the pictures so that they will buy the underwear, but they also can't have pictures with only white women, b/c Target has a large POC demographic to cater to as well. So the WOC models are thrown in, but cropped so as not to alienate the white women looking at the pictures.

At least, that's what I see when I look at it.

"They want white women to identify with the pictures so that they will buy the underwear, but they also can't have pictures with only white women, b/c Target has a large POC demographic to cater to as well. So the WOC models are thrown in, but cropped so as not to alienate the white women looking at the pictures."

As if they thought low enough of WW to assume all will be alienated by WOC showing entire faces in the ads...

Now that I think about it, these ads insult WW in a way too (though not as much as they insult WOC).

Eugh. At first I was just like "meh, I don't really care that much about cropping faces in lingerie ads". Then I saw your point... Once could be coincidence, twice I think not. Eugh.

Fenriswolf: Once could be coincidence, twice I think not.

"One is chance, two is coincidence, and three is enemy action," so goes a CIA proverb.

In this case, there is still a 1/4 probability that this would happen purely by chance. With all the ads run by Target, it is to be expected that at least some which feature multiple presentations (eyes shown/eyes not shown) and multiple races would have a race match up with a type of presentation, even if Target advertisers were completely race-blind.

underwear ads should be banned! If we don't go out in public in our underwear, then why are they showing us in our underwear in public? Do we not know what the purpose is for underwear that we have to have a visual aide? To me this is the problem itself. having our naked bodies plastered all over everything no matter where you go is what's wrong here. i know that the point here is to reveal the racism in this ad, but I think it's kinda funny for us to be demanding equality in the sexual exploitation of women. The whole idea of revealing us in our most vulnerable and putting it out in public so that men can get a piece of ass for free and then systematically be taught to expect this from women is the problem. That's why we have a rape epidemic. and no, I'm not referring to women dressing slutty. I'm talking about an environment where everywhere you go you see naked women being degraded and humiliated in public, in addition to the way that we're choosing to portray ourselves. men are being taught that rape is okay, cause he's offered a piece of us as soon as he steps out in public. Sorry, i am in support of equal representation for minorities in our society, but I'm not going to encourage any woman or man to take off their clothes for money and then let them plaster them all over so they can be degraded.

So, the White women get to have faces - but the Black women just get to be dehumanized breasts attached to a faceless body?

WTF?

That is so racist it's not even funny!

I think most of the comments here are completely wrong ("the pictures are racist", etc), caused by not knowing anything about photography or evolutionary psychology.

The reason the models were cropped as they were was to avoid having the eyes of the model in the picture, since (for evolutionary reasons) we are drawn to the face and eyes like a magnet. This would have the unwanted effect of diverting the viewer's attention away from the clothing (which is what they're trying to sell).

By cropping out the eyes of the model, the attention of the view is drawn elsewhere. Typically this means the brightest part of the photograph.

(Note that even the model in the top left is looking away from the camera. She's looking at something else, and this creates interest for the viewer, who subconsciously wonders what it is she's looking at. Photography and other visual arts are about the interaction of the subjects and its viewer. When you look at any kind of art, what is your reaction?)

All of the photographs are lit from the top and (camera) right. The light is coming from the top to simulate the sun; from any other direction the light would look unnatural (because we evolved in an environment in which the source of light always came from the top).

The causes shadows to form on any surface away from the light. Photographers do this all the time to create the illusion of depth on a two-dimensional medium. (Had the models been lit from the front, there would be no depth at all, and it would just look like a mug shot.)

Contrary to claims that the photographs "dehumanize" the models, in fact just the opposite is true. These lighting techniques make the female models look, well, like actual women, curves and all.

The model in the lower left is cropped, but this has nothing do with a racist conspiracy (for all we know, black women buy more lingerie than white women), and everything to do with the fact that it's a white bra on a black model. I said the viewer is drawn to the brightest parts of the image, and so where do you think you're going to look in that picture? What is the brightest thing?

The art directory probably wanted at least one close-up of a bra, and so she would have chosen a full-figured woman to model it. The issue is that you're selling lingerie, not sex, and if the eyes weren't cropped out it might have looked a bit too erotic. (A woman signals sexual availability by looking directly at her potential sexual partner. A photo we would regard as "pornographic" or otherwise erotic invariably has the subject looking directly into the camera: at you, the viewer. This is what "making eye contact" is all about, as it creates intimacy. When we're trying to avoid intimacy, we do everything we can to avoid making eye contact. Take a stroll in any big city if you don't believe me...)

Now look at the photo in the upper right. What is the brightest part of the photograph? There's a white circle superimposed on a darkish background. Your attention moves there, and that white circle nicely frames the woman's torso, just the place where the lingerie is located. Had the model's eyes not been cropped, then her eyes would be competing for your interest, diverting attention away from the clothing.

The thing to keep in mind is that the purpose of these pictures is to make you buy the lingerie. To model the lingerie, you need female models, and the photographs are lit in a way that maximizes the illusion of three-dimensional form on a two-dimensional medium. Contrary to opinions expressed on this forum, this makes the women look the most beautiful, just the opposite of dehumanizing them. But if you have picture of a female model wearing few clothes, then the art director must perform a balancing act, to sexualize the models enough to draw your interest, but desexualize them enough to draw your attention to the product being sold.

Cheers,
Matt

Matt-

Thanks for the insider info, but I don't think it explained why those rules apply to the WOC but the WW still gets her face. Or, why most all other campaigns do not crop out heads and faces.

I really would be interested to hear a follow up. Thanks.

Have we seen this article from the British Independent?

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/men-women--the-secrets-of-skin-colour-796610.html

And I quote:

"In an analysis of more than 2,000 advertising photographs of men and women, the researchers found that the skin of white women was 15.2 per cent lighter than the skin of white males, and the skin of black women 11.1 per cent lighter than the skin of black men.

Advertising photographs were chosen because almost invariably the models were considered to be among the most attractive people of the races and genders.

What the research shows is that our aesthetic preferences operate to reflect moral preferences. Within our cultures we have a set of ideals about how women should look and behave. Lightness and darkness have particular meanings attached to them and we subconsciously relate those moral preferences to women... they found that women with the darkest complexions were more likely to be in an advanced state of undress. They were also more likely to have a bared midriff, and only they are shown with bared feet or are implied to be totally nude.

The darkest-complexioned women in this group were also likely to be provocatively dressed, wearing underwear or similar clothing. Women with the lightest complexion are more likely to be conservatively dressed and portrayed as friendly, happy and honest."

Yeah, it's like that. Ew.

"underwear ads should be banned! If we don't go out in public in our underwear, then why are they showing us in our underwear in public?"

Just curious, what do you think of swimsuits?

I'm with chris on this one. I seem to remember reading in a Feminism course in a similar study that men's faces are shown in ads almost twice as much as women's. I don't doubt, either, that the race thing was by chance. Very little is in advertising.

I also don't know why they'd want to pick someone so skinny, with no personality or identification other than her skinniness, to sell me underwear. Something that looks good on someone who's over six feet tall with the figure of a boy isn't going to look good on curvy short me. In fact, it's a general rule of thumb for me to avoid skinny people selling underwear, generally because the underwear is designed to look good on models and "naturally" gazelle-like women, not anyone I know, and certainly not me.

Of course, I'd also probably walk out the door in disgust once I saw the racial preference in the cropping way before I got to my pet peeve of designing clothes for people that weigh as much as my cat.

"underwear ads should be banned! If we don't go out in public in our underwear, then why are they showing us in our underwear in public?"

Balderdash. Are you a nudist? Do you only wear clothes when you go out in public? Maybe some of us *want* to see ourselves in our underwear.

I think the outrage over this here is pretty hypocritical considering this decapitated woman didn't matter when it was for the right cause (as MirandaJay noted).

I'm an art historian doing mainly iconography. Which is, to put it simply, language of the pictures. I've also done tons of photography and photoshopping so I guess I have quite an idea about the process and the effects.
Since in art history I specialize on Medieval art, I don't really see the whole as Matt described it above. Actually I see the whole and then scrutinize the details, the corners (the donator with their coat of arms is placed in the corner, usually, for example), the things that are not there but somehow should be there.

There's a theme called Vision of St. Bridget of Sweden of the Nativity in the Cave of Bethlehem. Which is what it is - The Nativity in the centre of the composition, the angels and such in the upper part and St. Briget kneeling somewhere in the corner, going almost unnoticed unless you look for the figure and yet, she's the most important person because she gives the real meaning to the whole image. However, not much later the theme changes into Adoration of the child - the Nativity as described by St. Bridget became to be so well known that the visionary was no longer needed and the theme started to live its own life.

If you have a human being on a picture, nude, dressed, anything in between, it's a human being. Even when depicted from behind or with eyes covered somehow (as Matt described, eyes are the focus, then). When you crop the head, it's another theme. It's not the whole human being. Yet, it's not a picture of a sweater or a bra either, there's the piece of human being. I do not see some deep reason for depicting a piece of human being in such cropped image. If I use a comparison with Medieval stuff, you can have a relic, say, an arm of some obscure local saint, encased in silver reliquary which is even arm-shaped. At first, you might find it gross but given the right context, you start to get the whole thing. That it's an expression of deep faith and reverence. A piece of woman on a photograph, in such a context as on the pics above.... is a piece of woman. I cannot find any other sense in that. And I don't like women (or human beings of any other gender) cut in pieces, even if only visually.

Sorry for such a long blurb. Hope it's comprehensible.