Historically Racist Ads

An Ad from 1866-1904 of the brand 'Aunt Jemimah' promoting a pancake mix. 

Source // University of Washington Libraries, Special Collections. New York Historical Society

Photographed in this advertisement in Nancy Green, a freed slave hired by the ad company. Advertisers based Aunt Jemima's figure on the song "Old Aunt Jemima." The song was usually perfomed by White men, slave owners, dressed in blackface.

White enslavers frequently referred to enslaved women working in the home as "aunt."  The White salesman who invented Aunt Jemima anchored the character in enslavement, and linked White consumers' romanticized picture of the "Old South" with their pancakes (Boomer, 2023).

Aunt Jemima is also linked to the racial stereotype of "mammy," a Black female housekeeper. The mammy appears to be dedicated to her White enslavers and content to serve them. She is shown as loyal and compassionate, yet she is appeared to be lacking in intelligence by the way her speech is portrayed at the top of the ad (Boomer, 2023). 

This ad links to the ideals created by historic anthropologists that promoted the notion African Americans are "less competent" than White people, just on the basis of their appearance alone (Baker, 2007, pg 12). The advertisement capilalized on societies' racial stereotypes in order to profit.

An ad depicting the use of soap with the intention of lightening one's skin tone. 

Source //  La Trobe University

This ad was promoted and created by the brand known today to be Dove. The ad itself insinuates that not only will the soap lighten the skin, promiting it as something that is beneficial, but is also promoting the idea that the lighter your skin is, the cleaner you are. 

During the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, European colonial powers such as Britain, France, and Belgium ruled over most of Africa and Asia. These colonial powers propagated the notion of European supremacy and utilized their power to impose European cultural and visual standards on the populations they enslaved. One of the ways these ideals were imposed was through skin tone (Conor, 2023)

White complexion was thought to be a symbol of superiority, and colonial rulers tried to dissuade people from doing things that might darken their skin, such as working in the sun or wearing traditional attire (Conor, 2023).

These advertisements frequently used racist tropes to portray Black people as unclean, uneducated, and inferior. This promotes the reification of race as a biologically determined fact because it relies on the evaluation of skin tone and appearance as something that could be changed or 'improved' to appear more 'civilized.' 

This advertisement was promoted between 1938 and 1947, and shows a Black woman standing by an electric sink to promote it. 

Source // GE Electic Sink, Puzzle Pieces Marketing

This is yet another hisorical ad that perpetuates racial stereotypes. The most important aspect to observe of this ad is the way the woman is depcited to be speaking: "I'se Sure Got a Good Job Now!" 

The portrayal of the Black woman behaved in a stereotyped manner fostered the impression that all Black people behaved that way, and that all Black working-class people were illiterate (Broadus, 2022).

This connects to the reification of race by promoting the dated anthropologist idea that skin tone and race depicted someone's intellectual ability, and that Black people were less competent than White people.