TY - JOUR
T1 - “Born exhibitionists”: examining humorous responses to the Maidenform dreams campaign (1949-1969)
AU - Van den Bossche, Astrid
N1 - Funding Information:
My deepest thanks go to the welcome and help received at the Archives Center of the Smithsonian National Museum of American History, as well as from participants at the Hagley Museum and Library fall conference, “Commercial Pictures and the Arts and Technics of Visual Persuasion,” where I presented an early version of this paper. This work was supported by the Economic and Social Research Council, the Scatcherd European Scholarship, Green Templeton College, and the Saïd Business School Foundation.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2024 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.
PY - 2024
Y1 - 2024
N2 - In post-WWII United States, Maidenform’s “I dreamed I went shopping in my Maidenform bra” campaign (1949–1969) was seen as a prime example of the psychoanalytical sell: the ads seemed to tap into the repressed psyche of the 1950s housewife, directly pulling the levers of deep-seated sexual desires. This remarkable account has carried over into more recent analyses with little interrogation as to its soundness, and non-Freudian variants have equally re-iterated a “duped housewives” narrative. These accounts, however, tend miss out on the humor that characterized both the ads and the audience’s responses to them. The Dreams might have led to purchase, but they were also reimagined across popular culture in the form of plugs, puns, spoofs, jokes, pranks, parodies, fancy dress, and college floats. In this paper, I explore how Maidenform’s message migrated from the company’s control to a fixture in consumer culture. I argue that humor enabled audiences to mull over the implications of ads’ message and articulate the tensions and discomforts around the depiction of women’s bodies and mental aspirations. This study highlights how consumer responses can complicate dominant narratives in the history of advertising to women.
AB - In post-WWII United States, Maidenform’s “I dreamed I went shopping in my Maidenform bra” campaign (1949–1969) was seen as a prime example of the psychoanalytical sell: the ads seemed to tap into the repressed psyche of the 1950s housewife, directly pulling the levers of deep-seated sexual desires. This remarkable account has carried over into more recent analyses with little interrogation as to its soundness, and non-Freudian variants have equally re-iterated a “duped housewives” narrative. These accounts, however, tend miss out on the humor that characterized both the ads and the audience’s responses to them. The Dreams might have led to purchase, but they were also reimagined across popular culture in the form of plugs, puns, spoofs, jokes, pranks, parodies, fancy dress, and college floats. In this paper, I explore how Maidenform’s message migrated from the company’s control to a fixture in consumer culture. I argue that humor enabled audiences to mull over the implications of ads’ message and articulate the tensions and discomforts around the depiction of women’s bodies and mental aspirations. This study highlights how consumer responses can complicate dominant narratives in the history of advertising to women.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85186896166&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1080/14680777.2024.2313669
DO - 10.1080/14680777.2024.2313669
M3 - Article
SN - 1468-0777
JO - Feminist Media Studies
JF - Feminist Media Studies
ER -