Media shapes our idea of beauty by the advertisements we see. An advertisement like Hard Tail clothing has every girl in the advertisement skinny and in shape. It might not surprise you to read that most American women think that they are too fat. However, many people do not realize how these ideas about body image have boiled down to mostly children and young adults. We do not have to go much farther than a billboard, magazine advertisement, or well-liked television show to understand the concern over how girls and women are being portrayed as a whole. There are many reasons why the media shapes the way women feel about themselves. Advertisements may be used to sell people products and to communicate messages about body image, self-confidence, social ideals, and behavior. There are two advertisements that truly show similarities on the way women are portrayed in the media. One is for the BORA BORA fragrance by Liz Claiborne and the other advertisement is for Hard Tail Forever clothing company.

As highlighted by Health Canada, the average American woman is 5' 4" tall and weighs 140 pounds. The average American model is 5' 11" tall and weighs 117 pounds (45).There are 3 billion women

who do not look like supermodels and only eight who do. Ninety percent of all girls between the ages three and eleven have a Barbie doll, an early role model with a figure that is inaccessible in real life (53). In both advertisements all the women and men are very lean and in immense physical condition with flat stomachs and no fat on their bodies anywhere. The man in the BORA BORA advertisement has a powerfully built stomach, which would tell men that they would also look this good if they have the advertisements fragrance. All the people in both advertisements are very attractive, which would tell the reader that if you wear these clothes and this perfume you need to look and smell like these people and you will be happy like them.

Also in both advertisements we can see that the people in the are all at a place of beauty and in the Hard Tail advertisement they are at the mountains with a beautiful blue ski and in the BORA BORA advertisement it shows everyone at a beach with a beautiful sunrise and pretty pink flowers and blankets on the bed. Both of the advertisements are showing that with these items you will be able to be at this place with that man, look that good, and feel that way if you have their products. This appeals to the reader because it shows us where we could be if we were like the people in the advertisements.

The

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Approximate Word count = 908
Approximate Pages = 4 (250 words per page double spaced)