Blog tasks: Sephora Black Beauty Is Beauty CSP

 Wider reading on Sephora Black Beauty Is Beauty -


Complete the following questions/tasks:

1) What was Sephora trying to achieve with the campaign?

They wanted to celebrate Black culture by highlighting Black stories, communities and cultural traditions behind popular beauty tools and techniques beloved by people everywhere.

2) What scenes from the advert are highlighted as particularly significant in the articles?
  • The camera pans over Black women waiting under dryers as the narrator poses the question, “What is beauty without Black beauty?" 
  •  In Black Beauty Is Beauty, Newman gets her flowers, with her patented hairbrush design highlighted in the film. 
  • The film shows a white person applying a cut crease, then cuts to a trio of drag queens beating their face, then to vogueing at a drag ball.

3) As well as YouTube, what TV channels and networks did the advert appear on?

 BET, OWN Hulu, HBO Max ; branded content and podcast advertising through Vox and New York Magazine’s The Cut; and digital ads across social media networks. 

4) Why does the Refinery29 article suggest the advert 'doesn't feel performative'? 

Thanks to Bradley’s vision, inclusion of history and all body types, orientations and races, Black Beauty Is Beauty doesn’t feel performative. No one feels left out. The film has more inclusion in its under-a-minute runtime than two hour features have in their whole film.

5) What is the 15 per cent pledge and why is it significant?

Sephora’s page has links to Black-owned brands, and Sephora pledges at least 15% of their shelves for Black-owned brands. Sephora is leading through words, actions, and money for Black beauty innovators.


Media language: textual analysis -

Watch the advert again and answer the following questions that focus on technical and verbal codes. Use your notes from the lesson to help you here.  

1) How does the advert use camerawork to communicate key messages about the brand?

Establishing shots/ close-ups - on make-up(face & products): classic conventions of beauty advertising. Importance to Black community.

2) How is mise-en-scene used to create meanings about black beauty and culture?

Lighting - house: warmth. make-up : highlights beauty, and technique of Black creators.
Actors  - representation young/old, gender, queer, race - widespread influence of Black culture.
Make-up - drag make-up, highlighter, protective Black hairstyles, body butter. 
Props - hairbrushes, hair steamer.
Setting - salon: iconography of  Black community. house: intimate, love, warmth, family.

3) How is editing used to create juxtapositions and meanings in the advert?

Split screen - blurring of old and new (postmodern)
Close ups and rapid editing - creates movement and pace
Editing makes parts look like a yt tutorial - digital culture
Close ups - convention of beauty adverts (model, products etc)
12-way close up - diversity of beauty(young/old, gender etc) , and inclusivity.
 
4) How are verbal codes used to create meanings in the advert - the voiceover and text on screen?

"cut creases" - use of specific terminology to add expertise and authority
"doing it for the culture" - aligning itself with black culture
"post" - digital nature of culture nowadays
"Join Sephora" - call to action - encourages audience to take part

 
5) What is the overall message of the advert? 

They wanted to celebrate Black culture by highlighting Black stories, communities and cultural traditions behind popular beauty tools and techniques beloved by people everywhere. 
The message  is to promote and give awareness to the public on how black culture has impacted the beauty industry. 

Black Beauty Is Beauty (MM, 259) -

1) Look at the exam hint on the first page. How does Sephora as a brand and the CSP specifically reflect contemporary social and cultural contexts? 


2) Media theory: how are Butler, Gauntlett, bell hooks and Gilroy applied to the CSP?

  • Gender is a social construct in which individuals “perform” their gender. This is represented in the advert when drag queens, who are anatomically male, perform traditionally female rituals by applying make-up. 
  • Reinforces Gauntlett’s ideas that there is now a much broader range of representations in the media, challenging traditional notions of gender identity. The text provides the audience with an array of options for how people of colour could present their identity.
  • Hooks’ notion that black women are excluded from mainstream media representations is contested in this text. In the advert, the Sephora brand aims to attract a diverse audience, and all the females featured are people of colour.
  • Gilroy’s Postcolonial theory, which posits racial hierarchies, is challenged in this advert. The advert does not reinforce but rather challenges hegemonic standards of beauty, such as white, slim, Eurocentric features, etc.

3) What aspects of media language are highlighted on page 3 of the factsheet? 
  • Camera pan - salon - fluidity creates momentum and energy
  • Medium close up - tools - beauty forgets attributed to Black origins.
  • Split screen/mirror shots - stories - products in action. 
  • Binary opposition - old versus new.
  • Close-up - hairbrush patented by Lyda Newman
  • "cut creases" "beat faces" - Black American/Drag slang terms
  • Voice-overs - "a mothers love" 
  • Transition - smiling, dancing - subverting negative stereotypes of Black people.
4) How does the factsheet summarise the advert on the final page?

Overall, the advert deviates from the conventional focus on individual products or brands and instead centres on the message of inclusivity and diversity. The audience is encouraged to relate to the depicted images of people in their own homes, bedrooms, and beauty salons. 

5) What are the four ideologies in advertising highlighted in task 8 on the final page of the factsheet? In your opinion, do you feel the Sephora CSP advert challenges or reinforces each of these?  

Consumerism - it's not about buying more products but the acknowledgement of Black people. Gender fluidity - inclusion of drag queens accepts gender fluidity in the beauty community. Challenges gender norms, and celebrates difference. 


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