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Subject:

AEJ 97 FriedA VC When Chicago Tribune rescued trapped suburban women

From:

Elliott Parker <[log in to unmask]>

Reply-To:

AEJMC Conference Papers <[log in to unmask]>

Date:

Tue, 16 Sep 1997 12:37:52 EDT

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TEXT/PLAIN

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A Time Out of Mind:
When the Chicago Tribune rescued trapped suburban women
 
 
Alan Fried
College of Journalism and Mass Communications
University of South Carolina
Columbia, South Carolina 29208
 
803-777-6086
[log in to unmask]
 
 
 
 
 
A Time Out of Mind:
When the Chicago Tribune rescued trapped suburban women
 
A Chicago Tribune self-promotion advertising campaign from the 1950s was
analyzed using ethnographic content analysis and proxemic analysis of
photographs. The campaign stands out for the way it depicted its audience, its
voice, and for its advertising appeals. Although the appeals hearken back to the
Social Ethos described by William H. Whyte, Jr. in The Organization Man and
David Reisman's The Lonely Crowd, the ad campaign fits within Media System
Dependency Theory.
A TimA Time Out of Mind: _
A Time Out of Mind:
When the Chicago Tribune rescued trapped suburban women
        Cataloging a collection of newspaper self-promotion advertisements that were
published from 1876 through 1970, I came across a curious reader-oriented ad
campaign that provides a unique window into the life of suburban women of the
1950s. The campaign, which was published by the Chicago Tribune, features photos
of suburban mothers praising the newspaper as a social conduit that will spirit
them away from the mundane world of kids and housekeeping and place them in a
more exciting sphere. The campaign is a rosetta stone for understanding reader
dependence upon a media system and it is something more; it is a somewhat eerie
evocation of a time out of mind and the minds that inhabited those times.
        I have been examining advertisements that newspapers run on their own behalf in
hopes that they might provide new understanding about the growth and development
of the press, their advertising practices and their efforts to win the attention
of readers. Happily, a treasure trove of more than 4,400 U.S. newspaper
self-promotion ads (some dating as far back as 1876) are collected in the
voluminous archives of the University of Illinois College of Communications
library. These newspaper ads are a small part of the more than three-quarters of
a million advertisements that comprise the D'Arcy Collection, a gift to the
University from D'Arcy Masius Benton & Bowles advertising agency.
        Of course, countless artifacts of the suburban lifestyle at mid-century remain
extant. Kinescopes of television shows and especially situation comedies, motion
pictures, magazines and novels, sociological studies of the era, photo albums
and biographies tell the story quite well. Although lifestyles have radically
changed, the communities Dthe homes, the shops, and workplacesDstill stand. Why,
then, is this set of Chicago Tribune advertisements worthy of consideration? The
campaign stands out for the way it depicted its audience, its voice, and for
the advertising appeals that the newspapers used to motivate potential readers.
It tells us how a powerful newspaper pictured its readers and this insight may
help explain the relationship between modern newspapers and their readers today
.
        Pop sociologists of the 1950s talked about the need for belongingness, the
sense of alienation and isolation that characterized suburban women. This study
will argue that the Tribune newspaper campaign exploited these feelings in
picture and word. There was a certain transparency in the psychological ploys
that the Tribune campaign used that strongly suggest they were intentionally
employing the social science of the era. At the same time, the Tribune
photographs portray these suburban readers with a plaintive honesty that may
have exceeded their intentions. This study will employ (a) ethnographic content
analysis to identify these themes in the advertising copy and (b) proxemic
photographic analysis to validate visual observations about the people depicted
in the ads. A discussion of these methods follows this introduction.
        The women in these ads prospered in a post-war culture that is hard to
recognize today. In The Organization Man (1956), William H. Whyte, Jr. provided
a rich, ironic inquiry into this culture and found that social utility was the
core of their belief system. Whyte's book, a New York Times best seller for
nearly a year, brought world attention to Park Forest, a Levitt-town -style
prefabricated planned community on Chicago's far south side. It is a certainty
that the promotion staff of the Tribune knew about the book and the notions that
Whyte and others were expounding. The Tribune reviewed the book in 1956 and
serialized an abridgment of it in 1957.
        Whyte believed that no generation had been as well equipped, psychologically as
well as technically, to cope with the intricacies of vast organizations. None
were as adaptable to the constant shifts in environment that organization life
would demand of them. The ads depict the women surrounded by their children and,
we now know, this young generation would prove far less resilient to the
vicissitudes of corporate life. Where the Organization Wife (and she was
principally a wife and mother) would sublimate her individuality to the group
and would try to belong to her suburban community, her children Dand perhaps her
grandchildren D would rather sacrifice domestic stability and community ethos
for individual career success.
        In The Lonely Crowd: a Study of the Changing American Character (1950), David
Riesman described how middle class life nurtures a culture in which the
individual is other-directed rather than inner directed. Individuals rely upon
the group, rather than themselves, to set their values. Whyte agreed with
Riesman and criticized the impact of this stance arguing that the 1950s
suburbanite saw conformity to the system as essentially benevolent. Following De
Tocqueville's dictum that, "The more equal social conditions become, the more
men display this reciprocal disposition to oblige each other." [1] Whyte warned
that suburbanites who acted in concert with others for good reasons only made
the tyranny of social pressure more powerful by compounding its impact. In the
advertising, campaign, the newspaper is portrayed as another channel for
socialization in the life of the reader.
        In the 1950s, advertising began to speak to middle class Americans in
psychological terms that would resonate with their values. Advertisers found the
new medium of television could create images that would resonate more strongly
than ad copy alone. In their own self-promotional campaigns, newspapers rarely
used image advertising to win over readers. Typically, they stuck to the
benefits of the product. Ads to garner readers would promote new comics and
columnists, a topical special series or a holiday feature. When compared with
other ads, the Chicago Tribune broke new ground by offering the paper as a cure
for a psycho-social malady.
Media System Dependency
        The aim of the advertisements fits well within Media System Dependency theory.
In that theory, information resources controlled by the media create dependency
relationships at all levels of modern society; these relations account for the
media system's central role(s) in the organization of personal, group and social
(community) life. Through media system dependency, we can better understand why
mass communication has become so necessary to understand, act and even play in
our complex, multi-dimensional world.
        In explaining the theory, DeFleur and Ball-Rokeach divide human behavior into
the need into the need for self-understanding, self or action orientation and
solitary play and the need for social understanding, interaction action and
social play. As they describe it:
 
     Social understanding dependencies develop when individuals utilize media
     information resources to comprehend and interpret people, people and
cultures of
     the present, past or future. Self-understanding refers to media relations
that
     expand or maintain individuals' capacities to interpret their own beliefs,
     behavior, self-concepts, or personalities. Central to the orientation
     dependencies are questions of behavior. Action orientation refers to a
multitude
     of ways in which individuals establish dependency relations with the media
to
     guide their own behavior. Interaction orientation dependencies require
that
     the object of action be one or more persons. When individuals glean media
     information about the kinds of behaviors that are appropriate or effective
in
     dealing with their personal relationships or with occupants of social or
pro
     fessional positions. [It will be seen that the Tribune campaign is
primarily
     action-oriented.] Finally, the same personal versus social distinction is
made
     with types of play dependencies. Solitary play dependency refers to the
     instances when the aesthetics, enjoyment, stimulation or relaxation
properties
     of the media itself are the attraction. In social play, in contrast, the
     dependency relationship is based upon the capacity of the media to provide
     content that stimulates play between people. . . (DeFleur and Ball-Rokeach,
1989)
        They also provide a graphic to describe the typology:
 
 
Understanding
Orientation
Play
Self
Self-understanding : learning about oneself and growing as a person
Action orientation: deciding what to buy, how to dress, or how to stay slim
Solitary play: relaxing when alone or having something to do by oneself
Social
Social-understanding : knowing about the world or community
Interaction orientation: getting hints on how to handle new or difficult
situations
Social play: going to a movie or listening to music with family or friends
 
 
The Tribune campaign:
        Some 200 of the 4,400 ads in the D'Arcy collection come from the Chicago
Tribune. The Chicago Tribune promotional department was formally established in
the 1910s and was always one of the most sophisticated in the nation. During the
1900s, they were one of the first newspapers to recruit their own team of
comic-strip artists and they would syndicate these features. In the early 1920s,
they ran an 8-page new car section. Most other newspapers would not attempt such
a move until after World War II. In the 1930s, they formed a special research
unit called the Sociology Department that examined circulation distribution and
new business opportunities. They were one of the first newspapers to run ads in
specific trade magazines, e.g., restaurant and home builders' magazines, to
recruit advertising.
        This particular advertising campaign ran in the spring and summer of 1958,
right when children were heading back to school and non-working mothers began to
have time on their hands. It is the ad design that unifies the eight
advertisements of the campaign; in almost every one, a real women (not a
professional model) is photographed in her home surrounded by her children. The
woman is always looking toward the camera. The copy is set off by a headline in
which the woman is quoted talking about the Tribune and relating it in some way
to children.
y Loneliness. The first ad in the series does not follow these specifications,
but it
  sets the tone and the mood. The headline asks, "Are you ready to scream from
  loneliness?" The woman in the photo is wistfully peeking out her window at the
outside
  world.
 y Mrs. Armstrong.. A smiling woman is shown leaning, propping up her infant in
a
  crib. She declares, "Having my first baby might have been quite different if I
hadn't
  read the Trib."
y Mrs. Bohentin. The second ad is the only one that shows the newspaper. The
smiling
  woman is shown on the couch with her daughter on one side and her two boys, in
ties,
  on the other. Her baby sits on top of the newspaper which is draped on her
lap. She
  declares, "Reading the Trib is as much a part of my day as is washing dishes
or
  cooking."
y Mrs. Gonwa. Similarly, the third ad also shows a woman on a couch holding an
  album-sized book while two of her six children cuddle on her lap. The older
children
  perch over the couch and look at the book. She declares, "That extra nudge I
need to
  get going in the morning is the Chicago Tribune."
y Mrs. Lechowski. The fourth ad shows a medium close-up of a woman standing
behind the
  bars of a playpen. Her daughter stands in the playpen while she cradles the
baby. She
  confides, "If you could listen in when we talk over the day's problems, you'd
know why
  we take the Tribune."
y Mrs. Kammerer. The fifth ad shows a woman kneeling, holding her older son
while her
  infant sits in a child's rocking chair. She declares, "I never thought I'd
read a
  newspaper three times a day as I do the Tribune.
y Mrs. Savage .The sixth ad features one large picture of a smiling woman in a
house
  dress protectively clutching an infant. Below this are two smaller pictures of
the
  woman watching, with her infant on her lap, as her two older children play the
piano
  and clip articles out of the paper. The woman, a Mrs. Melvin R. Schreiber of
Homewood
  Illinois, declares, "After the children have gone to school, I relax with the
Chicago
  Tribune."
y Mrs. Schreiber .The seventh ad features one large picture of a smiling woman
in a
  house dress protectively clutching an infant. Below this are two smaller
pictures of
  the woman watching, with her infant on her lap, as her two older children play
the
  piano and clip articles out of the paper. The woman, a Mrs. Melvin R.
Schreiber of
  Homewood Illinois, declares, "After the children have gone to school, I relax
with the
  Chicago Tribune."
y Mrs. Tullis. The eighth ad, shows a woman on a couch surrounded by her five
  children. The children range in age from 11 months to 5 years. She declares,
"I got
  the Tribune habit when I was having my first child."
 Methods:
        In Qualitative Media Analysis (1996), David Altheide proposes a method of
ethnographic content analysis that allows the meaning and pattern of studied
documents to emerge during the course of analysis. While other methods of
content analysis depend solely upon correlation, Altheide blends in expert
observation to elevate the textual content and context of messages. This new
form of ethnographic content analysis (a) recognizes the importance of the
'active' audience in determining the meaning of messages; (b) offers the
opportunity to measure multiple document forms and (c) most important, allows
for meaning to emerge while the protocol for content coding is reinterpreted and
refined.
        According to Edward T. Hall, "proxemics is the study of man's transactions as
he perceives and uses intimate, personal, social and public space in various
settings while following out-of-awareness dictates of cultural paradigms. . .
The camera, coupled with a detailed notation system, proved to be the best
available means for collecting raw proxemic texts."(Hall, 1974) That is,
proxemics offers the best method for analyzing photographs as texts. While
proxemic analysis permits both auditory and olfactory coding, this study will be
confined to images.
Ethnographic Content Analysis
        Qualitative Content Analysis or Ethnographic Content Analysis (ECA) requires
keeping detailed notes of the researchers' participation during the analytical
process as well as the field observation. The results of these additions places
the expert observer in the driver's seat. As Altheide explains it:
 
        The major tact of Quantitative Content Analysis (QCA) is to verify or
     confirm hypothesized relationships rather than discover new or emerging
     patterns. Indeed the protocols are usually constructed through operational
     definitions of concepts to obtain enumerative data for purposes of
measurement.
     (Krippendorff, 1978) . . .
        Ethnographic content analysis is also oriented to documenting and
     understanding meaning, as well as verifying theoretical relationships. A
major
     difference however, is the reflexive and highly interactive nature of the
     investigator, concepts, data collection, and analysis. Unlike in QCA, in
which
     the protocol is the instrument, the investigator is continually central in
ECA,
     although protocols may be used in later phases of the research. . .
        ECA follows a recursive and reflexive movement between concept
     development-sampling-data, collection data, coding data and analysis
     interpretation. The aim is to be systematic and analytic but not rigid.
     Categories and variables initially guide the study, but others are allowed
and
     expected to emerge throughout the study, including an orientation toward
     constant discovery and constant comparison of relevant situations,
settings,
     images, meanings, and nuances (Berg, 1989; Glaser & Strauss, 1967). To this
end,
     ECA involves focusing on and collecting numerical data rather than follow
the
     positivist convention of QCA of forcing the latter into predefined
categories of
     the former. ECA is oriented to check and supplement as well as supplant
prior
     theoretical claims. (Altheide, pp. 16-17)
        Altheide's insistence on an admission of participation in content analysis
acknowledges the presence of the investigator in research design in a way that
adds methodological rigor to the process. It helps us find new questions and new
answers. ECA has been used to study television shows, newspapers, electronic
documents and news magazines. Altheide describes eleven separate steps in the
ECA method. The steps of ECA, as Altheide describes them, are printed in bold
type. The first six steps amount to pretesting of the protocol or research
categories and questions.
1. Define the specific problem to be investigated:
        The Chicago Tribune spoke to women readers about using the newspaper to combat
loneliness and to help them live their lives more effectively. How do the women
pictured regard the newspaper in their lives? What columns or sections of the
newspaper do they read? Is the newspaper spoken of as a reflection of, what
Whyte calls, the Social Ethos of the suburbs. If so, what words are used to
evoke this Ethos?
2. Become familiar with the process and context of the information source.
Explore possible documents of information.
The investigator has cataloged 4,400 different newspaper self-promotion ads. The
investigator has also worked in a newspaper promotion department and, for that
matter, was a child in the Chicago suburbs during the period under scrutiny. The
ads forms the sample frame from which a selection has been made.
3. Become familiar with several (6-10) examples of relevant documents noting
particularly the format. Select a unit of analysis (e.g. each article) which may
change.
There are eight ads in the campaign. The unit of analysis will be the
advertisement. The copy of each ad will be examined.
4. List several items or categories to guide data collection and draft a
protocol.
The format of analysis is the advertisement. What makes this an ad and not an
article? How are picture, headline and other text displayed? Are there any other
elements that make this an ad? What elements make it an ad campaign? The frame
or theme is women talking to women about the newspaper. What do they say about
how they use the paper?
5. Test the Protocol by collecting data from several documents.
6. Revise the protocol and select several additional cases to further refine the
protocol.
What information is given about the women's lives? Do they describe themselves?
Are husbands and children mentioned? In what context? What other information is
revealed about the women in the ad? What general information about the newspaper
is offered? What articles or sections of the paper are mentioned? What other
information is mentioned?
7. Suggest a sampling rationale and strategy D for example theoretical,
opportunistic cluster, stratified random sampling. (Note that most studies will
use theoretical sampling.)
Altheide reminds researchers that they must answer the 'so what?' question. He
notes that few qualitative studies can be generalized to other populations.
Instead, sampling helps clarify the process and the significance of the message.
In a longer study, one might compare the ads to the number and kind of news and
feature articles directed to this audience.
8. Collect the data, using preset codes, if appropriate, and many descriptive
examples.
The eighth step of data collection also comprises the step in which the analyst
refines the process and begins to look for emerging patterns. Six of the preset
codes which were used are taken directly from Media System Dependency theory.
That is, we evaluated the ad copy to see whether the women, in describing how
they use the paper, use language that refers to Social understanding,
Self-understanding, Action orientation, Interaction orientation, solitary play
and social play. In addition, we measured whether they spoke about loneliness,
feeling trapped, if they mentioned their husbands and if they mentioned their
children.
        The last four steps of data analysis allow for more refinement of the
conceptual frame based on extreme and typical examples drawn from the findings.
9. Perform data analysis, including conceptual refinement and data coding .
Read data and notes repeatedly and thoroughly.
10. Compare and contrast extremes and key differences within each category or
item . Make textual notes. Write brief summaries or overviews of data for each
item.
11. Combine the brief summaries with an example of the typical case as well as
the extremes. Illustrate with examples of the protocols for each case.
12. Integrate the findings with your interpretation and key findings in another
draft.
Proxemics
        Proxemic observations can be made along 19 different dimensions. This study
will confine itself to ten of these: the situational frame, posture, body
orientation, lateral displacement of bodies (extended arms, facing each other
etc.), body distance and implicit change, gesture, expression or affect, eye
behavior, and bodily involvement. (Hall, 1974)
Limitations:
        Hall admits that proxemics is a complex science because Americans are not used
to measuring context that involves the researcher in determining interactions on
19 different scales. Contexts differ over space and time, over the frame of
activity and over the relationship that the subjects have for each other.
Observers have a sensory bias in terms of what they see and what they regard as
important within certain culturally specific dimensions. (Hall, 1974) Altheide
does not discuss limitations in the same way but there are strong
correspondences to bias in ethnographic analysis.
 
Findings:
Proxemics
        Hall cites Roger Barker's work as presenting the importance of the situational
frame. Both Hall and Barker argue that the setting, as one aspect of context, is
inextricably linked with behavior and that given a particular context, an
individual chooses (unconsciously) which one of a number of behavioral
repertoires is appropriate. Hall goes on to argue that situational frames
constitute the smallest complete components of culture. (Barker, 1968; Hall,
1974) In this series of ads, we see women and their children. However, the
situational frame of posing women with their children, and the choices that
either the photographer chose and the women accepted place the women on a rough
par with their offspring.
        Just as Sherlock Holmes found a clue in the dogs that didn't bark, it is the
absence of something important that tells much about these photographs.
Although they are mentioned occasionally in the advertising copy, husbands or
fathers do not appear in the frame. The women are portrayed with their children
and not as wives or lovers. This is significant for two reasons. First, husbands
served as an important outlet to the outside world. Even if one were to dismiss
the fact that suburban housewives interacted with their peers (as neighbors, and
occasionally as coworkers) and with adults that they met in shopping centers and
in clubs, it is strange not to acknowledge husbands as emissaries to the outside
world and not to see them in these family photos. The Tribune seems to be
offering itself as a substitute for the conjugal partner. Here is a clear case
of the newspaper suggesting a dependency.
        Second, by placing the women on a par with the children, especially in the
photos where they sit shoulder to shoulder with them, the women are, in some
subtle way, made infantile. Indeed, in the case of Mrs. Gonwa, Mrs. Savage and
Mrs. Tullis, it is hard to distinguish them from the children at a fast glance.
In this regard, it may be of some significance that two of the other women, Mrs.
Armstrong and, especially Mrs. Lechowski, are placed near cribs which seem to
pen them in.
        Mrs. Bohentin, Mrs. Gonwa, Mrs. Schreiber Mrs. Tullis literally can not get up
because their children are holding them down. The responsibilities of large
families aside, these women are stuck in their seats.
        The woman pictured in the Loneliness ad and nearly all the rest are pictured
without showing their legs. It is as though they can not leave the house. As
will be seen, the copy makes use of many direct allusions to entrapment. While
we do see Mrs. Tullis' legs, they are hidden behind one of the children. Only
Mrs. Bohentin clearly shows her legs and, curiously enough, only Mrs. Bohentin
is pictured with the newspaper on her lap. In two of the other pictures, the
women are seen holding children's storybooks. (Mrs. Bohentin may have gotten the
last laugh. It appears that she is using the newspaper to shield her dress from
getting wet from her baby's diaper.)
        As noted the photos were also examined on nine of the nineteen dimensions
suggested by Hall. (Figure 1). The dimensions that seem to show the most
uniformity involve body orientation, distance and implicit change. In terms of
orientation, the women are leaning, squatting or sitting. In no case are the
children seen at the feet of the mother looking up at her or in any way doting
upon her needs and wishes. Again, this suggests a certain subservience in her
role. Of course, the women are sitting quite close to the children but there is
no case when the mother is elevated or beyond the touch of the child. Finally,
in all cases, the women are grasping or clasping the children to them. This
suggests a protective quality, which might have been the aim of the
photographer, but it also suggests a certain diminishment within the frame. The
women are trying to draw themselves in and make less of themselves.
        Overall, we have seen that the photographer was trying to make a statement
about these women. Aside from the layout and design of these pages, and the
copy, it is these photos that immediately draw the eye and articulate a
statement about suburban housewives.
Ethnographic Content Analysis
        Only two of the women referred to the newspaper as an aid to understanding
themselves. Mrs. Gonwa, the mother of six children, said it provided the extra
nudge she needed in the morning and Mrs. Lechowski said it helped when she and
her friends talked over the day's problems. Most referred to the paper in terms
of keeping up with the outside world, but three of them talked about how it
freed them from feeling trapped or stuck at home. For instance, Mrs. Bohentin
talked about a mother's confined environment and not having much chance to see
the world. Mrs. Gonwa, who majored in journalism in college, said the newspaper
is her only outlet to the world and that she would feel all alone if not for the
Tribune. Mrs. Savage said she longed for some adult conversation and the
Tribune filled news filled the bill. DeFleur and Ball-Rokeach talk about how
the media aids in understanding new problems and situations; they refer to this
function as interaction orientation. A number of the women mentioned this. In
fact, the Tribune's 'Loneliness' ad said "When you are new in the neighborhood,
and you don't know where to turn." Later, the copy talks about "four walls that
seem to close in on you " and "your new home seems like a prison." The women
spoke in less bleak terms. Mrs. Armstrong found out about childbirth classes and
that is why, "Having my first baby might have been quite different if I hadn't
read the Trib." Mrs. Bohentin said she turns to the Tribune, "When I don't know
where else to turn, when the kids come down with something." Mrs. Lechowski said
that when she has the Tribune, she's "not alone with the problems we face with
the children" and that "The Tribune comes up with so many answers." Mrs. Tullis
talked about how, when you are an expectant mother, "there are things you
hesitate to ask others." She said she didn't feel "stuck, all by myself" when
she could find good advice in the Tribune.
        By far, most of the women spoke about the newspaper in terms of practical
action orientation. Every one spoke about grocery shopping with the Tribune.
Mrs. Armstrong and Mrs. Bohentin praised the fashion news and Mrs. Schreiber
spoke about "getting the most for our money" and how a Tribune subscription
"pays for itself in the savings from the ads." Mrs. Savage said they found their
home through the Tribune and "it helps us manage our money." The Loneliness ad,
which was written by Tribune copywriters, says the Tribune can do the following
for women: (1) it is packed with features to help you cook, (2) it can help you
care for your children, (3) it can help redecorate your home, (4) it can help
you change your hairdo and (5) it brings you the greatest selection of
merchandise.
        The women hardly regarded the newspaper for social or solitary play. Two of
them did mention relaxing with the newspaper and their cup of coffee in the
morning. They also spoke about the entertainment news in the Hedda Hopper and
Tribune Ticker column. One of the women mentioned that her husband liked it for
the sports pages and another said her husband was devoted to Goren's Bridge
column.
Conclusions
        Frankly, the double entendre headlines and the old-fashioned photos of suburban
mothers saddled with so many children first attracted my attention when I saw
this campaign. But there is clearly something more going on here. This campaign
is unlike anything that any other newspapers were doing at the time.
        As women have left the home for the workplace, as they have taken the reins in
creating advertising and in critiquing advertising, we are unlikely to ever
again see such blatant attempts at reducing women to household roles. The Social
Ethos that Whyte and Reisman has given way as suburbia has become more
diversified in lifestyle and in ethnicity. But that does not mean that other
kinds of stereotyping are not being used in media self-promotion.
         The topic of reaching readers with emotional appeals has reappeared recently
in the newspaper industry trade press. The International Newspaper Marketing
Association ran an article in the September 1996 edition of their Ideas
magazine, "Reach Readers Emotionally by Paying Attention to Art Techniques
(Stiegel and Higgins, 1996) and in their November edition, an article entitled
"Intense Marketing Focus Needed Today" also talks about emotional appeals of ads
(Graham, 1996). Similarly, recent articles in the Newspaper Association of
America's Prestige, talked about "People and Product: Women, By the Numbers,"
(January 1996), "Catching Readers on the Run," (July/August 1996) and "Profiles
of GenX Journalists and Readers (October 1996).
        With newspaper publishers so focused on marketing the product, rather than on
improving it and making it more useful to readers, it is instructive to measure
the intentions of publishers by their advertising generally, and most
especially, by the way they typify their readers. It is clear that in this 1958
campaign, the Chicago Tribune could only see their female readers within the
context of very restricted bounds. The tools of ethnographic content analysis
and proxemic analysis when coupled with media system dependency offer one method
of measuring the intentions of media that market themselves.
Bibliography
David L. Altheide. 1996. Qualitative Media Analysis. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage
Publications. "Catching Readers on the Run," July/August 1996 Presstime, p.7
John Collier, Jr. and Malcolm Collier. 1990. Visual Anthropology: Photography as
a Research Method. 1990. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press.
 Melvin DeFleur and Sandra Ball-Rokeach. 1975. Theories of Mass Communication.
NY: David McKay. Fifth Edition.
Erving Goffman. 1979. Gender Advertisements.. NY: Harper.
John L. Graham November 1996 "Intense Marketing Focus Needed Today" Ideas, p.
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