User:AlysonMunson/sandbox

Function Ranking

Overview

Erving Goffman was a sociologist, social psychologist, and writer. His largest contributions to the study of sociology are seen through his study of symbolic interaction. This focus lead to his studies of advertisement and the ways that certain advertisements showcase gender. Goffman describes the idea of Function Ranking as when men and women work together to complete a task and the man takes on the ‘executive role’. Examples of this can be seen in the workplace, at home, in public, and especially with children.

Insight Goffman identifies many other themes that can be seen through advertisement that show gender and gender roles in different ways. Some advertisements display Goffman's theories more clearly than others, but the main idea is that that least one of these themes are seen in most forms of ads throughout all different media channels.

Function Ranking is the idea that when men and women collaborate on a certain task in the ad, they still have specific roles to portray. Women usually take the side that is more submissive while the men take on the ‘executive role’ that is usually in charge of the task. This idea stems from the age-old idea that men are usually in charge no matter what task they are completing. When taken in different contexts the theory can change slightly but the main points of Function Ranking still are applicable and readily seen through advertisements. Those depicting families usually have the men in a powerful stance, or take the place of the leader in the family.

Examples Overall, many advertisements show only one gender. But when looking at those from collaborative environments you can start to see a pattern in the representations of men and women in relation to the scene.